


My Immortal

by TheAPULS



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Angst and Feels, F/F, Immortal Scully, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Sex, Romance, Slow Build, Slow Romance, Vampire Scully
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-03
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2018-05-30 23:02:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 62,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6445774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAPULS/pseuds/TheAPULS
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if The X-Files became public knowledge? What if Mulder and Scully's work became the framework for new legislation in a world that now has proof of extraterrestrials and other paranormal phenomena? What if Reyes and Doggett finally came together? And had children? If Scully doesn't die, while everyone else does, how does she stay sane? And what if a vampire bent on revenge makes sanity even harder for our favorite red-head? Set 26 years after the events of <em>My Struggle II</em>. Think of this as an interesting thought experiment. And F/F Scully romance, 'cause that's how I roll.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue-Best Friends Forever

Reyes-Doggett Home

Washington, DC

July 26, 2030 -- 10:24pm

It was late, and dad and mom were fighting. Again. And it was her fault. Again.

Tessa told herself not to listen, but she couldn't help it. She had that _feeling_ all day long growing in the pit of her stomach and the back of her head. So, she listened, her ear pressed to the bedroom door as tears silently streamed down her face.

"Damn it, Monica, she's _twelve_! She's too old for this and you know it!"

"And what would you like me to do about it, John? JJ slept with his security blanket under his pillow until _he_ was twelve and he _still_ sleeps with his stuffed tiger. So, she's twelve. She's also shy and introverted—"

"Exactly! How can you expect her to break out of her shell and talk to _other_ people when she's talking to herself all the time?"

"Why don't you admit what really bothers you, John? It's not that she has an imaginary friend, it's _who_ that imaginary friend is."

Tessa swallowed a sob. It wasn't just a feeling anymore. It was a screaming certainty. She blindly crept to her bed and cowered under the covers, head under her pillow so the voices were too muffled to make out. Mom understood. Why couldn't dad?

"Tessa." The voice beside her was soft and sad, so sad.

"You're my best friend!" Tessa whispered and held the pillow down even more firmly. It was getting hard to breathe but she didn't care. She'd _rather_ suffocate—

"No, sweetie, don't think like that."

"What d-did I d-d-do wr-wrong?" Tessa stammered, her tears coming faster. "Why ca-can't I still b-b-be y-y-your f-fr-friend?" She abruptly sat up and threw the pillow across the room. At least she tried to. Quick as a cat, a pale arm snaked out of the darkness, grabbed the pillow, and tossed it back to flop in her face. At any other time that would have made her giggle but now it just made her feel worse.

A gentle hand wiped Tessa's cheek. "You can still be my friend, Tess. You just can't—see me anymore. Or talk to me out loud. Do it in here instead." A finger tapped the girl's forehead. "And here," the finger then tapped her chest where her heart was.

Tessa sniffled and looked up into the warm, blue-green eyes of the woman sitting beside her; they looked like two glowing jewels in the darkness. In the dim light that came from her window, the girl could just make out the curve of her cheek, the angle of her nose, and nothing more. Not that it mattered. She knew her best friend's face better than she knew her own.

"What if you forget me?" Tessa whispered.

"Never." A pause as the glowing eyes grew wistful "But _you_ may forget _me_."

Tessa threw her arms around the woman's neck and hugged her fiercely. "Never!"

Strong arms pulled her in and held her close. "Then there's nothing to worry about, is there?"

Tessa thought about that—and had to reluctantly admit that she was right. But it still hurt.

"I know it does, sweetie. Growing up hurts sometimes."

"I'm gonna miss you."

"All you ever have to do is think about me. Think of me as hard as you can and I'll be where you are."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

Tessa felt herself being laid down and tucked in. A soft kiss was pressed to her forehead. "Go to sleep now."

"Okay." Tessa yawned. "But—can you stay? Just a little while longer? Please?" She smiled as she felt familiar weight settling beside her. "I love you, Dana."

"I love you too, Tessa," came the whispered reply.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

When Tessa opened her eyes the next morning she knew Dana was gone. No, not gone, just—away. There was _something_ with her, _inside_ her. She could feel it. Tessa tapped her forehead then her chest. "I'll never forget you. Ever," she whispered the promise then untangled herself from her covers and padded to the bathroom.

Tessa found the pendant while she was making her bed. It was a simple, gold cross with a loop at the top so it could be hung from a chain. It was lying next to her pillow where Dana's head would have been until she went—wherever it was Dana went when she wasn't with Tessa. Her friend had left a promise of her own.

Twelve-year-old Tessa Reyes held the little gold cross in her palm and smiled.   

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Like an Angel Passing Through My Room" -- ABBA


	2. Chapter 1-I Will Remember You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Monica Reyes says goodbye, and Tessa has to cope with loosing her mother. Just touches of Scully for now.

Reyes-Doggett Home

Washington, DC

November 16, 2041 -- 4:30pm

 

Tessa used her old house key to let herself in. JJ's car wasn't in the driveway and that surprised her. Her brother was _always_ early—she'd _never_ beaten him to an appointment or an engagement. Ever.

"Tessa?" A voice called out from down the hall. "Is that you?"

"Nope. I represent the satanic cult across the street. Can I interest you in the wonders of selling your soul to the devil?"

Tessa followed her mother's laughter to the back bedroom. "One of these days that smart mouth is going to get you in trouble." Monica Reyes sat up in the bed and held her arms open for her daughter. Tessa bent into them and returned the hug with feeling.

"Who says it already hasn't?" Tessa sat at the bed's edge. "JJ's not here yet?"

"Oh, he was here, alright." Monica's eyes were crinkled in amusement. "He's gone to Target for those antimicrobial wipes he swears by. You know how your brother is—"

"It's not clean if the germs are still there!" They spoke in unison then burst out laughing. Tessa sobered first. "Mom—"

"Teresa." The unaccustomed usage of her given name startled Tessa into silence. Monica took her daughter's hand, squeezed it hard, and shook her head. "I'll take it from JJ but not from you. _You_ know better."

Tessa sighed bitterly. "Yeah, I know. For all the good it does me."

"It’s my time sweetheart." Tessa looked away, unable to meet her mother's pleading eyes. "I’m almost 74 and—and I miss your father."

"I know, and I can _see_ him tugging on you. He doesn't want you to hurt. But hell mom, 74 is _nothing_ these days. And it's _operable_. The doctor says—"

"The doctor doesn't feel what I feel, Teresa." Not Tessa, or Tess, but Teresa: te-Re-za. The Spanish pronunciation, with no long e sounds anywhere. Only her mother and her mother's Mexican family said it that way and, God, how she _hated_ the American version! Tah-reeee-saw; it reminded her of a donkey's bray. Much easier to tell everyone to call her Tessa.

"Look at me." Tessa finally met her mother's brown eyes. " _See_ it. I know you can."

Tessa looked. She _saw_. She wished she didn't. Operable, the doctor said. And how could her mother tell them they were wrong? They were medical professionals, trained to know the ins and outs of the human body better than any lay person. They _still_ didn't trust the opinions of PNs—Paranormals—especially when the PN _was_ the patient.

"Shit."

"Hey." Monica gave Tessa a wan smile, "Language, young lady."

Try as she might, Tessa couldn't stop herself from tearing up. "Oh God, mom—" Her voice broke. Fuck, she was going to cry. She did not _want_ to cry, but this was her _mother_. Her mother was going to _die_ and she couldn't stop it! And she found herself being held as she broke down into hoarse, ragged sobs.

"Shhh, it's alright. Let it out." Monica tightened her arms around Tessa's shaking shoulders and stroked her daughter's long hair. Hair she'd clearly gotten from Monica along with her face, her eyes, her build—and her gift. They looked so similar that they could have been mistaken for sisters, at least until she'd hit 65 and her age had really begun to show. John had joked once that he was tempted to open an X-File on their daughter since Tessa was so obviously a clone. But he knew better, and so did she.

Where Tessa _looked_ so uncannily like Monica when she'd been younger, the girl was so much _like_ John in personality; how he'd hated to cry, to show weakness. Tessa had also inherited her father's tenacity, his need to know the truth even if it flipped his world upside-down, his fierce loyalty—and one other thing. Something that Monica wanted so much to talk to her daughter about, and could not. Not in this life. She _felt_ it.

It had been that way since Monica was five years old. She _felt_ things. The way she’d _felt_ in March of 2022, looking at five-year old JJ's itchy arm and knowing that he needed to go to the hospital _right now_. The way she’d _felt_ that John was gone that warm, June morning seven years ago, even before she'd opened her eyes. The way she'd _felt_ when Dr. Briceno told her the nagging ache in her side might be something more than a pulled muscle and he wanted to run a CT scan. She didn’t question those feelings then and she didn’t question it now.

'For all the good it does,' Tessa had said. Another echo of John; desperate to save _every_ life, protect _every_ innocent. But life didn't work that way and neither did their gift.

How Monica ached for her youngest. How she wished she could stay with her longer. But if she stayed it would hold Tessa back somehow. She _felt_ that too.  So, she did the only thing she could, she comforted her helplessly weeping offspring. JJ would get stuck in rush-hour traffic and wouldn't be back for at least another hour. That would be enough time for Tessa to cry herself out and rebuild her outward façade of strength. Then they'd both talk to JJ. And argue with JJ. Then _he_ would finally understand. She _felt_ it.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Only a handful of people attended the funeral; just a few close friends and a smattering of relatives. Mom and dad hadn't been particularly gregarious to begin with and once the PN mandates had been signed into law—well, after that, keeping to themselves probably just felt smarter.

Mom had made all the arrangements in advance. All anyone needed to do was show up on time at the right places. JJ had arrived early (as usual) and handled the mingling while Tessa needlessly checked up on the preparations. Monica Reyes had always been an excellent organizer. Her list of requests had been detailed and very precise. Nothing needed correcting. But Tessa loitered in the funeral director's office anyway, reluctant to join her brother and the other guests.

She didn't want to pretend-smile and thank these people for coming. She didn't want to shake anyone's hand. She didn't want to hear how sorry anyone was for her loss. It all felt like so much pretentious crap to her, which made her feel guilty for disregarding what was probably a sincere outpouring of support and shared grief from the people closest to her mother and father.

But Tessa didn't want to 'share her grief' when it _wasn't_ grief. She didn't believe any of these well-meaning people would understand what she really felt. She felt relief now that her mother wasn't in pain anymore. She felt happiness because mom and dad were together again (she'd been there at the end and had _seen_ it). She felt annoyed that, in a minute, she'd be forced to fake a bunch of things she didn't feel, like a bad actor in a really godawful play. She felt lonely because she'd only ever had two people in the world she'd felt safe talking to about any of this. Mom was gone now and the other—

_I wish Dana were here._

Tessa hadn't thought about Dana in years and she felt a little silly for thinking about her childhood playmate when she was supposed to be burying her mother. Dana Scully was a legend around her family's dinner table. The stories mom and dad told about the doctor-turned-FBI-agent and her partner working on the X-Files had fueled hours of play, running around the house and catching bad guys while meeting real-life monsters like the wolf-man, the Great Mutato, and the human fluke worm. And Dana was always in tow to help her interrogate suspects, handcuff the killer—or just hold her hand in the dark when things got scary, which, taking everything into consideration, they regularly did. When things got too scary, Tessa would turn on the light in whatever room they were in and they would talk.

Dana never seemed to get bored of her or her games. She never told Tessa that she was too busy to play or that she was tired. Dana seemed genuinely interested in any subject Tessa wanted to talk about and never talked down to her like many grown-ups did. That being the nature of an imaginary friend: unwavering attention and understanding for an imaginative child. Except in Tessa's case Dana hadn't been strictly imaginary.

Dana was a ghost. And Tessa, being a Paranormal, could _see_ her.

Never mind that Dana hadn't exhibited many of the established characteristics of a ghost. Paranormal science was still in its infancy. Declassification may have been universally embraced by all nations after the E-Pandemic of 2016, but studies that went beyond the extraterrestrial biologically enhanced—or EBEs—still encountered pushback and funding trouble, even after the PN mandates. Dana's particular manifestation may not have been classified yet, or it hadn't been experienced by enough PNs to rate a classification of its own. Tessa considered opening up an official line of inquiry on that—

Dammit, she was supposed to be out _there,_ at her mother's viewing, not in here hiding from a dozen or so caring individuals just because _she_ was the freak of nature in the room.

'They don't have to understand you. Try to understand them instead.'

Dana's voice was as clear as a bell in her mind and Tessa started in shock—Talk about a blast from the past!—then had to chuckle at her own reaction. Of course, she heard her old friend. In light of the direction her thoughts had turned, it was completely reasonable. Dana had always given her sound advice when she was a kid, she was in need of some advice now, and this advice was sensible when Tessa thought about it.

She _was_ going to miss her mother. That was a genuine emotion that she didn't have to fake and could accept comfort for. And she didn't have to try very hard to understand that any mourner would want some reciprocal comfort in return. She could do that too. So, she stopped hiding. She went out and mingled. She didn't pretend-smile but she did sincerely thank people for coming. She shook hands and dealt with it. When someone said they were sorry for her loss she nodded and replied that she would miss mom _so much_. She got through it and it wasn't godawful. It was actually a help of sorts.

Then it was time to head to the cemetery. It was at the cemetery where the trouble started.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "I'll Remember" – Madonna

                                             "May It Be" -- Enya

                                             "Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)" – Green Day


	3. Chapter 2-A Restless Spirit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tessa learns a lot more than she bargained for after her mother is laid to rest.  
> Note: There are some fairly explicit depictions of violence - reader discretion is advised.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a particularly long chapter - at least it seems to be - so my apologies to anyone whose brain melts at my verbose prose. If your mind is still intact at the end of this one, do read my end notes. I promise, they'll be mercifully short.

Kew Gardens Apartments

Washington, DC

May 6, 2042 -- 11:46pm

 

Tessa couldn't get her apartment door open. She couldn't fit her key in the lock she was shaking so hard. "Shit. Shit. Shit." She was panting the word, her breath coming in short gasps as her heart tried to hammer itself out of her chest. "Shit." The key slipped home. Finally. "Shit." She flung the door open. "Shit." She leapt over the threshold like a skittish horse and slammed the door closed. "Shit." Her trembling fingers twisted the deadbolt home. "Shit." That was when her legs went to jelly and she collapsed in a heap in the foyer.

She was safe. That's what she kept telling herself as she shivered in the dark. She was safe now. She was behind a locked door with solid walls around her. Nothing could hurt her here. She was safe.

Which was complete and utter bullshit.

Tessa forced herself to her knees then to her feet. She couldn't let the fear control her. Fear could and would get her killed. Nothing had come out of the night to finish her off. With every additional minute that ticked by, it became more and more likely that she was, indeed, safe. Nevertheless, as a precautionary measure and on the off chance that she'd been followed, she would not turn on any lights in the apartment.

She thought it all out in advance while taking deep, steadying breaths. First, she was going to change out of these funeral clothes. Then she was going to make a cup of tea. Earl Grey, strong, with a healthy squirt of lemon juice. After that—she winced at the thought of calling the hotline but it would have to be done and soon. She had to report this. She would drink the tea first then call the hotline and report. She would do these things in the dark. Simple steps. Completely doable.

Tessa carefully made her way through the gloom to the deeper darkness of the bedroom, wincing at the sharp arrows of pain in her knees and the deeper muscle ache in her left shoulder. Addendum to plan: take two Aleve with the tea. She stripped down methodically then slipped into the t-shirt and comfy, lounging sweatpants she'd left on the bed. There, step one done. Now to the kitchen and that tea.

She tried to focus on other things, making much of _anything_ she could, from pulling just the right tea bag from the jar, to picking out her favorite mug from the cabinet by feel. Nothing helped. She was unable to keep her mind from reliving the burial—and the horror that happened afterward.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Mom wanted to be laid to rest at sunset. The sky was glorious, a watercolor wash of rose pink, glowing orange, deep purple, and soft turquoise that had been mirrored on the lacquer finish of the coffin's lid as it was lowered into the earth.  She held JJ's hand and they'd each tossed a handful of dirt into the grave. The non-denominational pastor spoke some non-denominational words that she only half listened to. When it was JJ's turn to speak he began to cry and Tessa took his hand again to help him through. She elected not to speak; everything she'd needed to say to mom had been said before dad had taken mom's hand and they'd—gone. Then the ritual was over. She and JJ escorted everyone to their cars.

Twilight was deepening when Tessa let JJ know that she was going to observe the crew as they filled the grave and replaced the headstone. When he’d asked if she wanted company she’d said no. The truth was that she wouldn't have minded either way but one glance at JJ's fiancé kept her from answering as truthfully as she normally would. Heidi looked anxious, plainly uncomfortable, and clearly wanted to leave. Tessa couldn't bring herself to tempt JJ to stay.

"Go home," Tessa told her brother. "I'm fine."

And she _was_ fine. Cemeteries didn't bother her and neither did being out at night. She did her best thinking in the dark when she could look up at the moon or the stars. Truth be told, once the crew had reset everything, she intended to lean against the new stone, gaze up into the starry sky, and think about mom and dad for a while.

Tessa threaded her way back to the plot. She could just see the workers setting up; two burly men in hard hats and chinos were positioning a flood lamp while a third workman leaned against the excavator, smoking a cigarette as he shouted directions. And there was a fourth person, garbed in head-to-toe black, hunkered down beside her mother's open grave.

Tessa hesitated as she saw the hunched figure drop a white rose into the hole—her mother had loved white roses—and there was something about the crouching person that _looked_ familiar. Tessa thought it might be a woman from the free-flowing, shoulder length hair but she couldn't see her face or make out any real detail in the gloom. Whoever it was, she hadn't attended the viewing or the funeral, but given the choice Tessa wouldn't have attended either. She too would have preferred to say goodbye in private.

Then the figure stood and, at the same moment, the flood lamp powered on, bathing the whole area in bright, white light. Tessa's heart stopped as she took in the woman's features—the auburn-red hair, the oval face, the Roman nose, the shapely, long-fingered hand, the slim build. 

It was _Dana_. _Her_ Dana.

Tessa may have made a sound; she couldn't be sure. For whatever reason, Dana suddenly turned to her, looking as stunned as she felt. Then she was gone, winked out in less time than it took for Tessa to blink.

Ghosts were classified under two general categories: conscious and unconscious. Unconscious ghosts re-enacted actions thoughtlessly, manifesting more like movies than actual entities. Conscious ghosts reacted to their environment.  They reasoned. They could manipulate objects. Dana had consistently reacted to whatever environment she manifested in. Dana's past interactions with Tessa showed understanding and reason. Dana had manipulated objects before, and often. Dana was a conscious ghost. Tessa knew this, had _always_ known this.

The most logical reason for Dana's manifestation at her mother's grave was because she, Tessa, had wished for her friend back at the viewing. Dana, for her part, had done nothing more than what she'd always done: reacted to her environment, shown reason, manipulated an object.

Except that she had been solid. A complete physical presence. With weight. Not an _impression_ of weight, _actual_ weight. She'd thrown a shadow. She'd left boot prints in the _Goddammed dirt_ for fuck's sake. 

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Tessa brought the mug of hot tea to her mouth, holding it with both hands to keep its contents from slopping over. She was trembling again, fighting down another influx of panic. She was going to have to call this in. She desperately didn't want to but she couldn't see any way out of it.

Why hadn't she just gone home? Called JJ? Taken a long drive? Or anything else but what she'd done? How could she have ignored every warning sign? Why had she been so stupid?

"Because I stopped thinking," Tessa told the empty kitchen. "I didn't _want_ to think anymore." She'd never felt more ashamed of herself or her actions than at this moment—and all because she'd decided that not thinking for a while would be a relief. And now she couldn't _stop_ thinking. Or remembering.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Tessa decided to find a nice, quiet bar.

Night clubs were familiar territory but the thought of going to the Crowded House or any other beat-heavy, lossless lounge on Dupont Circle wasn't appealing. She wasn't in the mood to dance or be hit on. And she didn't want to go home where she was sure to dwell on that shadow, those heeled boot prints in the fresh dirt, and how, on one set of those tracks, the pointed toes were pushed in deep and down at a steep angle in the soft, moist earth. They indicated that whoever made them set off running from a standing start. They indicated that Dana hadn't vanished or dispersed like a ghost but had _run_ away, too fast to see—

She didn't want to think about that. She wanted to find a nice, quiet, local bar, sit in anonymity, and sip on something she hadn't tried yet.

She drove to Columbia Heights, known for its excellent neighborhood bars, told the meter to charge her account for two hours parking, and walked around for a bit until she spotted The Stalwart Tavern. There wasn't a cue to get in, no loud music hummed from the interior, and she was unexpectedly charmed by the sign hanging above the entry, an armored knight on a rearing charger, a foamy stein of beer in one raised hand.

When she took hold of the door handle she felt a threatening twinge at the base of her neck—the telltale first indication of a _feeling_ —but she disregarded it as nothing but nerves. The pitch-black mudroom behind that door didn't even jingle her radar. She simply crossed the lightless space into the bar proper like a stupid sheep begging to be eaten by wolves.

Hundreds of thousands had died of the Spartan Virus during the E-Pandemic of 2016. The Extraterrestrial Biologically Enhanced survived because they had been genetically engineered to. Many Paranormals had also survived, though there still wasn't any clear consensus as to why. Consequently, there were a lot of broken families with axes to grind, and an easy target for them to blame, namely the EBEs and PNs. That the death toll hadn't numbered in the millions because an EBE had developed the vaccine and disseminated the knowledge of how to produce it was inconsequential to them. The Naturalist movement was born.

Tessa had just ordered a pint of Guinness Stout when she realized that the bar was much too quiet. The hum of conversation all around her had ominously stopped. The _feeling_ was no longer just a twinge at the base of her neck, it was a thumping alarm on the inside of her skull. She fixed her eyes on the mirror behind the bartender. She saw at least ten hostile faces staring back and, far too late, the black bumper sticker affixed to the lower right-hand corner that read 'There's NOTHING Normal About Paranormal.' She'd walked into a bar of Naturalists and they knew she was a PN.

One of the most controversial of the PN mandates dictated that all EBEs and PNs be tagged with a microtracker. The device was tiny, painless, and would send regular location updates to a global network of cloud servers. The network was supposed to alert the authorities and/or the military in the event of a microtracker ceasing to register a signal for more than x number of seconds, or if a shift in location faster than x miles per second was recorded. The x's in question were kept confidential and system operations were designated top-secret/need-to-know in order to, 'prevent the conspirators against democracy from developing countermeasures and undermining the safety of citizens who were genetically altered or born different through no fault of their own.' That's how the president had phrased it at the time.

However, a lot of information on the tracker itself, including what it was made of, was public knowledge. It didn't take long for a Naturalist supporting engineer to build a device that could detect the presence of a microtracker. Websites sprang up, virtually overnight, with how-to guides. Selling pre-fabricated tracker-sensors became a cottage industry in some states. On the up side, they were fairly cost effective to produce and easy to put together with simple tools. On the down side, they were bulky, needed a hefty power source to run, and were impossible to camouflage without losing functionality.

Within five years of its invention any business with pro-Naturalist leanings had a tracker-sensor installed on their front door. Within ten years, however, the Supreme Court had ruled their usage discriminatory. It was now a federal offense to own or operate one. A little thing like the law wasn't going to stop the most militant Naturalists from doing so when all they needed was a dark enough entrance to hide the evidence. A dark entrance like The Stalwart Tavern's mudroom.

Cold fear washed over Tessa like an ice bath. She managed to keep a mildly pleasant expression on her face through sheer force of will and pulled two twenties and a ten from her wallet with numbed fingers. A nice chunk of cash might convince the bartender to hold off his other patrons and let her walk out of here. "On second thought, I'd better cancel that. But please keep the change for your trouble."

The bills fell limply to the counter. The bartender's eyes flickered down to them then back up to her and a look of complete hatred rippled across his face. She'd casually thrown down fifty dollars like it was a couple of bucks in a bar that catered to an income class where fifty dollars bought a family of four groceries for a week. Instead of defusing the situation, she'd tossed kerosene onto an open flame.

'Duck.'

Tessa responded to Dana's familiar voice without thought. Something whistled overhead and there was an angry roar behind her.

'To the left.'

She swerved to the left and a barstool crashed down on the spot where she'd been a moment ago.

'Run to the back of the room.'

Reflex and trust got her legs going in the requested direction, though she personally thought that heading towards the back was quite possibly the worst idea she'd ever heard. But then her own ideas hadn't exactly been sparkling examples of intellect lately.

'Go through the swinging doors. There's a staircase right behind it.'

Spurred by the uproar behind her, Tessa rammed through the doors like a linebacker and almost tumbled headlong down the stairs despite Dana's instruction. She seized the rail in a death grip, wrenching her left shoulder in the process, but it was a small price to pay for her balance. Her equilibrium re-established, she sprinted down to the bottom and found herself surrounded by all manner of cartons, kegs, and crates—She was in the bar's basement storage area. There was a backdoor just a few short feet away from her. It was standing wide open. For a split second she believed she might actually survive this. _Thank you, Dana_.

'Don't thank me yet.'

The door slammed shut with a resounding crash and a black shape flew towards her. She was suddenly shoved against the far wall hard enough to bruise her shoulder blades. Tessa tried to scream but a hand covered her mouth before she could utter it.

"Don't make a sound." This time, she heard the voice with her ears.

It was Dana pressed up against her, holding her against the wall. It was Dana's hand over her mouth and Dana's blue-green eyes furiously boring into her. Dana's free hand pulled two towering milk crate stacks in front of them, effectively blocking them from view. A moment later the screaming mob came thundering down the stairs.

Dana kept her hand over Tessa's mouth, one finger rising to her lips in the universal sign for silence. Tessa closed her eyes. She heard the door strike the wall as it was yanked open, heard loud, enraged voices inciting each other to 'catch the little freak bitch' as they poured outside. Then the shouting and yelling mercifully faded.

"Open your eyes." Tessa obeyed.

"Listen to me very carefully," Dana spoke in a tone as cold and hard as steel. "You and I are going back up those stairs. When I say the word 'now' you will _walk_ , not run, out the front door. You will then _walk_ calmly to your car and drive home. You will _not_ look back, no matter what you may hear or _think_ you hear. You will not pass go. You will not collect two hundred dollars. Do you understand? Nod if you do." Tessa nodded.

"Good."

Dana's hand came away from Tessa's mouth to settle like a vise around her wrist. Tessa gulped deeply of the malty air as Dana shifted the crate towers away. With a sense of unreality, Tessa registered that both crate stacks were head high to her and filled top to bottom with unopened bottles of beer. Dana had shifted each of them one handed as if they'd weighed nothing at all. Then Dana was dragging her to the stairs and they moved swiftly up and back into the front of the bar.

For the second time that night Tessa considered that she might survive her own reckless idiocy. Then a man stepped out of the shadows to block their path. He was built like a wall, with ropes of lean muscle over his tall frame. A biker or biker-wannabe in black boots, leather chaps over dark jeans, and a dingy t-shirt.

Tessa was unsettled by Dana's expression of cool calculation. There was no surprise, no consternation. It was as if she'd known all along that he was there.

"Get ready," Dana told her.

Biker Boy laughed as he'd strolled forward, "Oh yeah, get ready," he rumbled in a deep, bass voice and cracked his knuckles.

Tessa's wrist was released. "Now," Dana uttered.

Tessa moved to the door, expecting at any moment to be grabbed from behind. She'd reached the mudroom when she heard it: a sickening crack and a whistling, breathy scream. Tessa spun back toward the sound her heart pounding in her ears, her mind in turmoil. She _couldn't_ just walk out of here. Her mind had flashed to the shadow and the boot prints at the cemetery and the solid feel of Dana's body pressed up against her own down in the basement. If Dana was hurt—

The deteriorating shreds of all she'd held to be true until this evening continued to insist that Dana was a ghost, _had_ to be a ghost, that ghosts _couldn't_ be injured and _what the hell was she thinking???_ But what she saw blew all her remaining convictions away like so much confetti in a windstorm—

Biker Boy was on his knees. _He_ was uttering those tea-kettle screams. Dana had somehow pulled his left arm back and up until his shoulder had dislocated. His right hand was pushing desperately at the smaller, slighter woman but she didn't even sway with his effort. Her free arm wrapped around him and pulled him in closer. There was another dull crack and Biker Boy howled in agony. Dana let go of the man's arm—it flopped to his side like a dead fish—and grabbed the greasy hair at the back of his skull. Then Dana turned her head and met Tessa's terrified gaze. Dana's eyes were blazing orbs of blue-green radiance. "Go."

Dana's mouth dipped down to Biker Boy's neck and a spray of dark fluid burst forth in a fan where her lips met his throat. He didn't make another sound. Tessa turned and fled.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Tessa pressed both hands to her eyes. She wished she could blot out the memory of what she'd seen as easily, somehow push the recollections from her mind.

Dana Scully was _not_ a ghost. Dana Scully could not _be_ a ghost because she had never actually died as her mother and father—and she—had believed. Dana Scully, the legend. Dana Scully, the originator of the Scully-Einstein vaccine that had saved millions. Dana Scully, both blessed and blamed for the PN mandates. Dana Scully, who'd once been her best not-strictly-imaginary friend. Dana Scully, whom she loved dearly, even now. Dana Scully was a vampire. And now she _had_ to call the hotline. She _had_ to report it, all of it, including her own involvement, or risk imprisonment.

"Mom, I'm so sorry," Tessa whispered and reached for the phone.

A pale hand shot forward, grabbing the phone from its base. Tessa shrieked, turned, and struck the thing behind her with all her might, even as she knew it was the last, hopeless gesture of one who was about to die.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Ladies and Gentlemen" – Saliva

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was particularly challenging to work out how I could most effectively and smoothly transition the reader (you wonderful folks that survived the too-much-verbage mental meltdown) between Tessa's present and her memories.
> 
> I personally feel that the chapter is more interesting for the back-and-forth, and the effort was worth it, but I am self-doubt personified, so, to you all, a question - did my transitions work? Or should I have just done a straight telling from point A to point V?
> 
> Yes, it's a pun. I couldn't resist.


	4. Chapter 3-The Hunted / The Haunted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tessa gets a chance to become reacquainted with Dana but it doesn't go very well. Also a short, introductory walk inside Scully's dark mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for taking so long to get this chapter up, and I hope it's worth your wait fellow readers. Oh, and thank you to those who have left me kudos! :)

Kew Gardens Apartments

Washington, DC

May 7, 2042 -- 12:26am

 

Tessa shrieked, turned, and struck the thing behind her with all her might, delivering a low kick to the shin followed by a roundhouse punch to the face. Her fist was caught by Dana's shapely hand before it could connect and the kick did nothing but put Tessa off balance. She was kept from toppling backwards by Dana's steadying arm about her waist.

"You don't have to do that," Dana said softly. "I won't hurt you. I'd never hurt you." There was a wounded look in her eyes, and despite Tessa's terror, the pain in those eyes made her feel both foolish and embarrassed for lashing out.

"Well, I'd apologize but you _did_ scare the shit out of me," Tessa shakily replied. "To be honest, you're _still_ scaring the shit out of me. How in the _hell_ did you get into my apartment?"

"Through the front door."

Tessa's acerbic tongue overrode her sense of immediate threat as it so often did when she was under stress. "Dracula must be so proud," she quipped. "Did you waft under my door as smoke or fog?"

Dana made an exasperated noise through her nose. "I picked the lock, smartass. And before you ask I was already _in_ your apartment when you arrived. Okay?"

Tessa's next sarcastic remark died in her throat. She hadn't _felt_ another presence in the apartment. She'd always been able to _feel_ other presences around her. And then it hit her: she didn't _feel_ Dana at all. Not at her mother's gravesite, not when she'd been in the basement of The Stalwart Tavern, not right here in front of her. She swallowed hard. "I see," she said in a small voice.

"Look," Dana sighed. "I didn't come here to kill you or to frighten you. I just came to talk to you. If I let you go, do you think we can do that?"

Tessa's fist was still in Dana's palm, her back supported by the woman's pale arm. It felt as if Dana could hold her for hours in this position if she so chose. The two of them must look like dancers about to take off into an elaborate musical number. It was such a ridiculous image—and just like that all of her fear and apprehension evaporated.

"If you _don't_ let me go then you'd better dip me and lead me into a tango," she answered with a grin then winced when her shoulder gave a particularly painful twinge. "Right now, I'd prefer option one. I'm not up for option two."

There was a flicker of wicked amusement in Dana's eyes and a small smile rose to her lips. For a moment Tessa thought the redhead might actually dip her just because she'd suggested it then the moment passed. Tessa found herself first righted, then released, and Dana backed up a few steps with her hands upraised.

"Okay then." Tessa nervously ran a hand over her head. What should she say? 'It's great to see you again, Dana. How've you been? Oh, and when did you turn into the blood-sucking undead?' She didn't think her old friend would appreciate that as an ice breaker. "So—"

"It's a dangerous mistake to call the hotline. Don't do it."

Tessa's ire rose. "Did the official definition of talking change recently? Because I expected a conversation or an exchange of ideas and what I'm getting sounds a lot like intimidation."

Dana pinched the bridge of her nose and took a deep breath. "Alright. I am _asking_ you to consider not calling the hotline. I would like to _civilly_ converse with you about this topic. I am sincerely interested in your thoughts on this matter." The woman spoke each word slowly, carefully pronouncing each syllable, and Tessa seethed at the implied condescension she thought she heard there.

"Certainly, here's a thought for you," Tessa fired back. "You _cannot_ be serious. Not calling this in is an act of treason. I will be arrested. I doubt there would even be a trial, and _I_ can't turn myself into a bat and escape through the bars of my prison cell."

"I wouldn't let you be sent to prison."

"Ah, so are you planning to slaughter the arresting officers and whisk me away to your Transylvanian castle to hide?"

"Damn you!" Dana shouted turning sharply away. "Christ, I can't _believe_ this. You're even worse than—" There was a hitch, a pause, and then Tessa heard a soft sob from the woman. _Dammit_ , Tessa scolded herself. _Do you have to be such an ass all the time?_ Sometimes she really truly wished she had a better handle on her temper.

"Dana," Tessa began in a gentler tone, "I'm sorry. I just don't see how I _can't_ call this in. The surveillance video alone will identify me and—"

"No, it won't." Dana's soft voice cut in. "The footage isn't viewable. I made it look like unexpected solar flare activity hit DC, Maryland, and parts of the Virginias. No one will even know when you left the cemetery."

Surprise kept Tessa from an immediate response. "You made it look—" Tessa put two and two together and came up with an unbelievable answer. "Are you telling me that you _hacked_ into the National Surveillance System?"

Tessa could see Dana shrug in the dim light, "In a sense, yes, for lack of a better word."

Tessa's jaw dropped. "Holy shit, you _hacked_ into the National Surveillance System! No one has _ever_ hacked into the NSS! It's—it's impossible!" She needed to sit or she was going to collapse to the floor for the second time tonight, so she wobbled to the couch and plopped down.

"Nothing is impossible if you have a backdoor," Dana replied equably.

Tessa's mind reeled. After the Global Microtracker Cloud, the NSS was the most heavily protected computer system in the US. There wasn't a hacker on the globe that didn't fantasize about getting into one or both networks and a number of them had tried to capture that particular Holy Grail over the years. The very best only managed not to get arrested, a bragging right in itself. Those who weren't as lucky, or as good, disappeared into the nebulous mist of 'treasonous acts against the interests of the United States of America.' No record. No trial. Just gone.

Dana's casual statement made it sound so simple, as if having an undetected backdoor into a highly guarded, complex digital platform was standard operating procedure for her. Getting past the NSS's extensive security measures? Easy. Tampering with, not just DC's surveillance records, but that of its three adjacent states? No problem.

"Then you just blithely hacked into NASA and faked some solar flares too," Tessa bit down on a bubble of nearly hysterical laughter. "Simple."

"As it so happens, I logged into NASA first and got lucky," Dana answered and Tessa, already on edge, jumped at the nearness of the woman's voice. She hadn't noticed that the redhead had settled across from her on the loveseat. "There _were_ solar flares detected so I didn't fake anything. I just—nudged the numbers a little in the right places."

Damned if Dana didn't sound both defensive and embarrassed about falsifying NASA's data. The woman showed no remorse about committing a felony against the federal government but had a guilty conscience about messing with the findings from a little space probe?

"I still gave my credit account to the parking meter." Tessa knew it was a weak point and she was arguing out of sheer pigheadedness but she couldn't help it. She urgently wanted to keep Dana talking. Part of that need was a grim form of curiosity; she wanted to know just how far Dana had gone in her efforts to cover up the events at The Stalwart Tavern. The other part of it—and Tessa could hardly bear to admit this—was fascination.

Dana was a vampire. Tessa was engaged in what could be classified as the first non-violent interaction with a vampiric entity since the Cheney, Texas incident back in 1998. She felt terrified and exhilarated by turns. At this moment she was glad to be alive, thrilled that she was the conduit for this contact, and accepted that, at any moment, it could end in her demise. In a tiny, unaffected part of her brain she wondered if Neil Armstrong felt something like this when he'd first set foot on the moon.

Dana watched Tessa for a moment, her expression unreadable, then one corner of her mouth quirked in a half-smile. "I introduced a worm into the meter that deleted your transaction at both ends then ate itself."

Tessa laughed, "Ask a stupid question to a grand master, huh?"

"Grand master?" Dana's left eyebrow arched upward.

"Um," Tessa's humor faded a little. "You know, major hackers, the ones who get into big government systems or global networks and get away with it?" Dana continued to eye her expectantly and Tessa's sense of awkwardness grew. "Okay, ten or fifteen years ago, this guy at the New York Times wrote an article about political hacker organizations like Anonymous and Illuminatus. He wrote that hackers of their caliber were like grand master chess players because they're always ten moves ahead of their opponents. It became a sort of a slang term."

_Why the hell am I explaining this to her?_ Tessa thought bewildered. _Here's a better question, why do I_ have _to?_ _Where has this woman been hiding, under a rock?_ Unbidden came a particularly nasty idea; maybe she hadn't been under a rock but under a _tombstone_. Her palms felt very moist all of a sudden. _What if someone had found Dana and had incorrectly labeled her dead?_ She tried to surreptitiously rub her hands dry on her thighs. _What if Dana's body had been buried and she had still been aware?_ Her fingers gripped her knees hard. _Oh God, what if she'd had to **dig herself out?**_

"I'm not a walking corpse, Tessa," Dana broke into her morbid thoughts before they could spiral any further. "I'm not undead in any sense of the word. Bram Stoker, Anne Rice, all the movies," the woman shook her head and gently smiled. "They were good stories but nothing more. Okay?"

"Did you kill them?" The question burst past Tessa's lips before she could run it past her thinking brain. She numbly watched as Dana's face lost all animation.

"No."

Dana was up and most of the way to the front door before Tessa could scramble off the couch. "Dana, wait—" The redhead turned to her and a beam of soft moonlight lit upon the stark planes of her face. She was a marble sculpture come to life; _a Greek goddess_ , Tessa thought, _Athena or Demeter_.

"I did what I did to save your life," Dana's words were as icy as her expression. "I told you not to look back but you did. I can't change that, I can't even blame you for it, but no matter what you _saw_ or what you might _think_ , I'm no cold-blooded murderer. What that man _intended to do to you_ —

Rage suffused Dana's expression in cold fire and for one split second her eyes blazed with eldritch blue-green light. "I showed far more mercy than he would have," she hissed. A moment later the glow was gone and her expression resumed its chill severity. "As for his friends, they are very much alive at the moment and they will be arrested in the next 24 hours for various infractions that will not lead back to you. Within the next 72 hours The Stalwart Tavern will be subjected to a surprise fire safety inspection and it will be closed down.

"You now have two choices: go to bed and forget everything that happened after the funeral or call the hotline and experience first-hand what it's like to have your life crushed by a bunch of mouth-breathing bureaucrats." Dana turned away, swinging the door open. "Whatever you decide, it will no longer be my problem. You won't see me again."

Tessa couldn't move. Her feet were frozen to the spot she was standing in. There was an amorphous lump in her throat too large for her to speak around or to swallow. The only thing she could do was think so she thought as hard as she could at the retreating figure. _Please don't go. I don't want you to go. I've missed you. I need_ —she reflexively thought of her mother then of Dana herself— _someone to talk to._

There was the barest slump of Dana's shoulders as she paused on the threshold. "You haven't needed me in a long, long time, Tessa." The woman stepped through. "You're young and resilient. You'll be fine." The door closed with a subtle click.

Tessa stood unmoving, feeling the hated tears rise under her eyes. "Goddammit!" She ought to lock the front door but she couldn't bear to approach it. To think of laying a hand on the last thing Dana had touched before leaving—she felt something treacherously wet slide down one cheek and she swiped at it with a furious palm. Everything about this night had gone wrong. And it was all her fault. "God _fucking_ dammit!"

'Don't blame yourself.' The voice in Tessa's mind felt ancient, in pain, and so full of despair that her heart ached in sympathy.

_I'm sorry Dana I'm so_ fucking _sorry please come back please don't leave me alone too please!_ Tessa silently replied, her thoughts crammed together into one long, unbroken stream. She was bent nearly double at the waist by her efforts to send her desperate message, her fists pressed to her eyes. If she could just think hard enough Dana would _have_ to return.

'This isn't _Interview with the Vampire_. You're not Daniel. I'm not Louis. And that college you work for is not the Talamasca.'

Tessa felt Dana's mind retreating and she strained all the harder, trying to hold on to it. She wasn't a telepath, nor did she completely understand how telepathy operated, but whatever bond the two of them shared had never followed any traditional model, so she kept at it. She reached over and over again as Dana's consciousness continued to slip away from her, all the while begging, pleading, and cursing the woman on the other end of that disappearing thread of intellect.

There was one last whisper of awareness—'I'm going to miss Monica too, more than you could ever imagine.'—and Dana was gone.

There was no stopping the flood of tears now, nor did Tessa have the heart or the will to try. She fell back onto the couch, curled herself into a tight ball, and wept bitterly until she fell into exhausted slumber. She never heard the deadbolt snick into its locked position over her rasping sobs.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Dana Scully walked away from the apartment building, her heeled boots noiseless upon the pavement. She frowned at the lack of sound, considered the effort of adjusting her gait, and then promptly tossed the thought aside. There was no one else out on this block at this late hour to notice.

She could still hear Tessa crying. She could still _feel_ her distress and that was worse. Tessa's anguish touched on her own, overlapped it, and embraced it. She yearned to turn back, to comfort her, to take comfort from her—

No. You will _not_ do that. You will _not_ haunt that child anymore.

She was tired. So incredibly tired. She hadn't reached her first full century yet and all she wanted was to die. How long had it taken Alfred Fellig to get this tired? How long had the old photographer lived before the first time he'd tried to end that life? All things considered, Dana didn't think she was doing as well as he had, but then she also had a completely different set of problems to contend with.

Tessa's residential neighborhood had given way to the business districts. Dana knew she was walking too fast. If she didn't slow down people might notice. She didn't want to slow down but the alternative was to start running and she wanted to do _that_ even less.

There was a lovely, large oak tree on a distant corner. Dana approached, laid her forehead on its rough trunk, and closed her eyes. She couldn't hear Tessa with her ears anymore—she was miles away now—but her mind was another matter. What was it about Monica Reyes' daughter? Why couldn't she shut the girl out? She clenched her jaw and attempted to bar the grief from her consciousness. And again, she was stymied.

"Ow! Damn!" She stared in shock and revulsion at her right hand. Somehow, she'd dug her fingers into the bole deep enough to leave deep, inch long gouges, and fragments of the bark had pressed painfully into her palm and under her fingernails. She was so much stronger now that she'd—fed.

There was no broken skin, no visible injury, but her nerve endings still registered pain as if there _should_ be. Her epidermis _could_ still be pierced but it took a lot more than tree bark to do it these days. An interesting dichotomy. One of the many that had, at one time, fueled her initial efforts at self-study. She didn't try to scrutinize her condition any more or try to find a cure. She'd stopped searching for answers when she'd finally given up searching for Mulder.

Mulder. Dana winced and thumped her head against the oak's thick trunk. Even _thinking_ his name hurt. She pushed thoughts of him away with an irritated grunt. Everything and everyone she cared about was gone, lost or buried. And here she was still alive and unable to find a purpose to carry on.

Dana felt wetness on her face and she wiped it away with her sleeve. There was no point in mourning what she had been and could no longer be. Her only goal now was stopping herself from devolving any further into whatever alien thing this process was turning her into.

Clearly, she hadn't administered enough anesthetic in her last try. Intravenous agents were out of the question; she didn't believe an IV needle could penetrate her skin anymore. Maybe she could combine several inhaled agents. Containment would be no problem—a chest freezer would do nicely. The challenge was in keeping it filled with the drug cocktail for the necessary duration. She needed not just to lose consciousness, she needed to stay that way.

As she thought through the possibilities, Dana removed her boots, her socks, and then her overcoat, tucking them all into the leather sling bag at her shoulder. She then resumed walking. The concrete path beneath her feet was far from smooth. Odd pebbles and cracks pinched her soles at irregular intervals. The discomfort was a welcome distraction to the sorrow that still seeped from Tessa's mind into hers. Pain against pain. It was the only defense she had left and she prepared to use it ruthlessly. She stepped into the street and began to run.

She didn't own a car anymore. It was a risk to have a traceable vehicle even using one of her many aliases to keep it registered and insured. Nevertheless, she had, for a time, kept a nondescript, little sedan in her driveway until she could no longer stand the reminder that she didn't need one. At a dead run, Dana Scully was now far faster than any automobile ever produced.

And she hated it.

Of all the abilities she had developed, her increased velocity upset her the most. She'd always been physically powerful so, until she did something completely outside of the realm of human ability, she thought little of the additional force her muscles could exert; more often than not she found the added strength a convenience. The same with her resilient skin, she just didn't think about it unless she needed a blood sample for some reason—and she never had reason anymore. She only ever used her extrasensory capabilities to keep herself (and now Tessa, damn that girl) out of trouble. Even her hunger for blood was manageable and, with her medical knowledge, easy enough to indulge when it became absolutely irrepressible. But the speed was frighteningly predatory, an unnecessary skill except to hunt down victims. It was, in her opinion, the most completely bestial and thoroughly inhuman thing she could do.

The rugged asphalt bit into the balls of Dana's feet, jagged little teeth that brought instant tears to her eyes that never fell, so promptly were they whipped away by the air currents produced by her forward motion. She could already feel her blouse beginning to split in several places but there was no help for it. When she ran, her clothing suffered. At least this time she wouldn't melt her boot soles. The throbbing soreness below her ankles was doing its job. Tessa's suffering was a distant thing, just one of several torments causing her to weep.

Dana smothered a sob, balled up her fists, and forced her aching feet to run faster.      

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Ghost" – Ella Henderson

                                             "Stop, I'm Already Dead" – Deadboy and the Elephantmen


	5. Chapter 4-The Lost and the Found

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tessa makes some plans and some discoveries, and has a rather unpleasant day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Forgive me for taking so long between updates; I'd quit my day job if I could. ;)  
> I hope you enjoy reading this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Centers for Paranormal & Extraterrestrial Research

Washington, DC

May 15, 2042 -- 10:13am

 

After spending her weekend wrapped in a cocoon of melancholy Tessa emerged blinking into Monday's watery sunlight with one thought in her mind, a single objective so insane she approached it cautiously as one might approach an animal of uncertain temper: I have to find Dana Scully. She was unable to contemplate it as anything more than an interesting thought experiment at first. How does one find a woman that a) the world thought was dead, b) who had no intention of being found, c) who presumably had the resources to keep herself off the grid, and d) who also happened to be a vampire? The prospect was daunting on the face of it.

As far as she could tell, Tessa only had three points working in her favor: 1) she arguably knew more about Dana Scully, the person, than anyone else alive, 2) she had a definite place of reference to start her investigation, and 3) she had legal access to said place of reference. Addendum to point 3: she'd have legal access if she could convince the right people to give it to her, which could be tricky. There was also a concern (dwindling though it was as the days ticked by) that she might receive a visit from an official with Homeland Security regarding her presence last week at a certain bar—

It was Wednesday before Tessa felt she could make a formal request to access the vampire files. With a research outline in hand, case study numbers at the ready, and small army of names at her fingertips if she needed to ask for someone to back her, she'd been primed to fight any battle she had to—and not one bit of her carefully crafted arrangements had been necessary. She observed with mild puzzlement and a touch of relief as her application was immediately accepted. She was shocked to learn that her access code had been upgraded just an hour later.

Thursday morning found Tessa standing outside the locked alcove still half expecting a colleague to come running with a denial in hand and an apology for the mix up—she shook off her hesitation, entered her code on the key pad, and walked inside.

Most of the X-Files were declassified and open to scholarly examination at the Centers for Paranormal & Extraterrestrial Research. There were public tours given twice daily, Monday through Saturday, where 'interested patrons of paranormal and extraterrestrial lore'—also known as tourists—could look at Plexiglas enclosed case files, view a 90-minute long 3D presentation on the history of the X-Files and their impact on the PN mandates, and even walk through an accurate recreation of the famous FBI basement office where, 'Special Agents Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, Monica Reyes, and John Doggett had performed their underappreciated yet pioneering work in the paranormal sciences.'

_Hell_ , Tessa thought as she flipped the light switch, _for a small fee anyone could download color PDF scans of the files right from CPER's website._ There were certain sections, however, that only authorized CPER personnel were allowed to touch, kept in a separate, high-security division of the facility. One of those sections involved vampires, the only documented class of alternate human not to come forward after declassification, and the only earth-bound species labeled a known threat under the PN mandates.

The vampire section wasn't much larger than an average walk-in closet. A starkly, clinically white room with a single task chair, a tiny, stainless steel table—and the files. One wall was dedicated to file drawers, five up, and seven across. Embedded LED lights were programmed to emit a soft, green glow around drawers that contained material; most of the wall was depressingly dark. Tessa had known what to expect but it was still disheartening to physically see how minuscule the pool of records was.

There was remarkably little genuine information on vampires and few legitimate cases. A task force had been assigned to vampire research at CPER's founding in 2019 but, task force or no, almost nothing had been added. The reason for that was simple: the investigators had a disturbingly high mortality rate. After one particularly gruesome and very public fatality in 2022, the investigation on vampiric entities had been officially put on hold, and the hotline was launched in its place. Tessa regarded the number of empty drawers and guessed that the hotline wasn't having any better luck.

"Well, at least this won't take long," Tessa sighed and pulled open the first drawer.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

"If I’m _ever_ stupid enough to assume a research job won’t take long, _ever_ again, I’ll—I’ll—" Tessa ran both hands over her head in frustration.

The vampire files were a mess. What that wall of tidy, pristine, sterile drawers held within them was a chaotic mishmash of folders. They had not been arranged by year or by case file. They hadn't even been filed alphabetically. The records, it seemed, had been tossed together haphazardly, without any regard for logical or reasonable order. It was going to take days to get them organized.

Outwardly, Tessa was irritated and fuming but inwardly she was pleased, delighted in fact. Rectifying the situation would give her a valid excuse to peruse _all_ of the files, not just the few she'd initially cited in her outline. After all, just because no one had yet asked to see what she was working on didn't mean that no one _would_. She was both cautious and thorough by nature and she had every reason to believe she was being monitored. She had no intention of giving away her true purpose.

_If you're gonna hunt someone, you gotta get into his head. Know how he thinks. Know what his strengths are. Know his weaknesses. And believe me, everybody has weaknesses_. That was her father's voice. John Doggett's wisdom collected from his decades in law enforcement, first as a New York police officer, then as a detective, and finally as an agent at the FBI. It was that wisdom Tessa was depending on to help her.

Tessa felt uniquely capable of getting into Dana Scully's head. She had her memories to lead her—mom and dad's dinner-table stories, and all those play cases and long talks—and Dana's own work on the X-Files to give her perspective. The cluttered jumble of files in this tiny room would give her some insight into vampiric strengths and what weaknesses they might have. She hoped dad was right about the weaknesses. After that, it would all come down to a little luck and doing the work.

Tessa was willing to do the work. She was willing to do anything she had to if it meant seeing Dana again. The feel of Dana's anguish had gotten under her skin. She wanted the chance to help her. One chance was all she asked. And if her help was refused—she didn't know what she'd do if it came to that. Could she just let Dana go? She wasn't sure. Better to think of seeing her again. Easier to imagine reuniting with the redhead, giving her a long, warm hug—and then reaming her pompous ass.

The Centers for Paranormal & Extraterrestrial Research was a _legitimate_ organization! CPER's work— _her_ work—was just as valid as anything Dana had done at the FBI. Just because she, Tessa, didn't run around with a badge and a gun didn't make Dana superior and it certainly didn't give the woman any right to demean CPER. _College,_ huh? She'd show her a college.

"And what's wrong with the Talamasca?" Tessa growled. "I _like_ the Talamasca!" Her cell phone went off, distracting her before she could go off on another internal rant. It was playing the Star Wars theme—JJ's ring tone. She pushed herself away from the cramped little table and pulled the phone from her pocket.

"Hey, Obi Wan, what's up?"

"I need you down at the bank. Now." JJ hadn't reacted to the old Obi Wan joke at all. That was a little odd. Tessa frowned.

"Damn. Can it wait a bit, JJ? I'm up to my—"

"No, it _can't wait_ , Tessa!" JJ was suddenly shouting, his voice hitting high notes that Tessa hadn't known were in his octave range. "Fuck! _You_ were the one who _didn't_ want to go through mom's things, remember? You told me you didn't want to _deal with all this crap_ , right? Well, I've got some _crap_ here that _mom wants you to deal with_ , okay?!?"

"Okay, okay!" she exclaimed. JJ screaming? JJ _cursing_? Something was very wrong. "Just take a deep breath, alright?" She held her phone to her ear with her shoulder while hastily returning files to drawers. "I can be there in—" She eyed the clock above the door and did some quick math, "Twenty minutes. Twenty-five tops."

"Fine." JJ hung up on her. He'd _hung up on her_.

Tessa left the room without a backward glance. _If I take the car I can make it in fifteen_. For the first time in days, Dana was the last thing on her mind.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Tessa arrived at Cradock Marine Bank's main DC branch in twelve minutes though she bent a number of traffic laws in the process, citations be damned. She couldn't remember the last time JJ had lost his cool. _She_ was the volatile one, not him. When mister bedrock shook, that was one hell of an earthquake.

She held her temper rigidly in check while the bank rep located her brother with agonizing slowness. She had to tighten her mental grip as the man then led her in a leisurely amble to the safe deposit box viewing area. It was as he unlocked the door with a sluggishness that bordered on the funereal that she snapped. She grabbed the door by the edge, yanked it out of the rep's grasp, plunged into the room, and slammed it shut before the sloth in a suit could form an objection.

JJ was standing in the middle of the small room. She took the two steps to reach him and pulled her brother into a tight embrace.

"I'm sorry," Tessa said, her voice rough with emotion. "I shouldn't have let you do this alone. I should have been here. I'm an asshole."

JJ's arms came up and returned the hug stiffly. "I didn't mind, Tess," he replied, "I'm better at this than you are. I don't agonize over everything." He took her shoulders and pushed her gently back. "You'd just get in the way," he finished with a tight smile.

"But you said—"

"I _know_ what I said." JJ met her eyes with a chill gaze that stopped her cold. "I love you, Tessa. You're my sister. I love mom. I'll _always_ love mom." He turned from her then and stepped to the wood table with the closed safe deposit box on it. "But I really thought the woo-woo shit would stop once she died."

"Woo-woo shit?" Tessa's eyebrows rose in bewilderment. "What the hell does that mean?"

JJ didn't answer. He flipped the hinged lid of the box open with two fingers. The leading edge of the gunmetal top hit the table with a combined thwack-clang sound that made Tessa twitch convulsively. JJ pulled a large manila envelope from the interior and held it out to her.

"Take it and go home." JJ's tone was gentle, his expression was not.

Tessa grasped it with a trembling hand. "I want to know what woo-woo shit you're referring to," she said in an even tone.

" _That_ woo-woo shit," he replied pointing at the envelope. "The woo-woo shit that killed her. The paranormal, psychic crap that let her decide it was 'her time.' " He made mocking air quotes around the last two words.

"The tumor was eating her alive," Tessa whispered.

"The tumor was _operable_!" JJ shot back, thumping his fist on the table.

"That's not true."

"Right, because she _felt_ it and you _saw_ it." JJ made a harsh, choked sound deep in his throat. "Centuries of medical knowledge out the window. Hundreds of life-saving breakthroughs don't mean a damn to the magical Monica Reyes and her daughter, the seer."

"You bastard," Tessa hissed in outrage. "Do you think I _wanted_ to _see_ what I did? Do you think I _wanted_ mom to die?"

"No, but you enabled her to." JJ's mouth turned down in a grimace of disgust. "The two of you just shut me out and shut me down like you always did. Nothing could defeat the supernatural tag team. And I dealt with it. Just like dad dealt with it while he was alive. But now mom and dad are _both_ gone and _I'm_ not dealing with it anymore. I'm done, Tessa. I've had enough of your mystic bullshit."

"Are you off to join the Naturalist movement then? I'm sure they'd love to have you."

JJ gave her a patronizing glare. "Oh, grow up, Tessa."

"No, _you_ grow up," she snarled back, baring her teeth. "You're the one who wanted to be the big fuckin' Jedi, right? 'Use the force, Luke' and all that shit. Or that worm-riding prophet, Paul Atreyu—"

" _Atreides_. It's Paul _Atreides_."

"I DON'T GIVE A FUCK!" she yelled. "You, with your nose in all those books and movies. Could it be that you didn't figure it out?" She lunged at her brother and smacked him across the face, open-palmed. "They." She smacked him again, this time on his upper arm. "Can't." A strike to the thigh. "Turn." A blow to the ribs. "The." A direct hit to the back of his head. Her hand was beginning to sting. "Shit." A hard wallop to his backside. "Off." She kicked the same spot, breathing heavily and fighting to regain control.

JJ was hunched into corner covering as much as he could of himself with his arms. "Christ, Tessa—"

"No, John." She thought he might have flinched at the sound of his given name but she wasn't sure. "They can't shut it off and neither can I. The woo-woo shit is what they have to live with—what _I_ have to live with—every day, twenty-four-seven. It's not all saving the day and being the hero covered in glory. It's also dealing with a lot of hell and a lot of hate and wishing that you didn't have to. Wishing you could close your eyes, or your ears, or your mind, and knowing that _you can't_."

Tessa turned her back on him and strode to the door. "Do whatever you need to with mom's stuff and the house. Liquidate it, auction it, sell it, whatever, and send me a check for my half."

"Mom left you the house." He threw it at her like a parting curse.

"Then get your crap out of it and text me when you're done. No need to deal with my woo-woo shit. I don't want to see your face or hear your voice again." She threw open the door and found herself face-to-face with sloth in a suit. She shoved her way past him, bolted from the bank, and dived into her car.

Tessa felt as if she'd been plunged into the center of a glacier. She couldn't move, could hardly think, could barely breathe, and she was _so cold_. She huddled in the driver's seat shaking with reaction and gasping for air. _I've got to get a hold of myself_ , she thought as she gripped the steering wheel hard enough for her knuckles to turn white _. Because if I don't, and JJ comes out of that bank, I just might kill him._

Forcing the deepest breath that she could into her lungs, Tessa held it, counted to ten, and slowly released it. She ran through the breathing exercise again. And again. And again, until the shakes subsided and she felt she could drive without sideswiping someone in a fit of road rage. _I should go home_. She started the car and pulled serenely away from the curb—

Tessa blinked back into full awareness parked in front of her mother's house. _Her_ house now. She didn't remember the drive or making any conscious decision to come here. She couldn't blame her mind for retreating and letting reflex take over. Within the course of a few short hours she'd gotten her first real look at the vampire files, had received an out-of-control phone call from her brother, then, when she'd rushed to his side, he'd blamed her for mom's death and all but told her he'd had enough of her. The dream-like feel she'd started the day off with had taken on a distinctly nightmarish quality, so her body had taken her to the one place she'd felt safest of its own accord.

Tessa pulled out her keys, let herself in, and went to the back bedroom. The house still smelled subtly of mom—roses, citrus, a hint of nutmeg, and chocolate—but here in the bedroom, where Monica Reyes had spent the last months of her life, was where the scent and feel of her mother was strongest. Everything was as it was when mom had still been alive, from the bottles of perfume on the dresser, to the garishly colored Mexican quilt at the foot of the bed, a gift from some aunt or other. Mom had spent hours snuggled in it, said it had good vibes.

As Tessa reached out to touch the quilt, she noticed she was still hanging onto the manila envelope JJ had handed her at the bank. _I'm seriously not tracking well_. _What did I do, drive with it clutched between my palm and the steering wheel?_ It certainly looked creased enough from her grip. Mom had written 'For Tessa' in her characteristically loopy cursive on the face. The clasp at the back had already been popped open. That was classic JJ. He _always_ had to see everything first, _always_ stuck his nose where it had no earthly business, then got all indignant and self-righteous about it when you told him off—

"Wait a minute." The scene at the bank replayed itself in Tessa's head. Self-righteous and indignant? Check. Frightened and angry? They were new to the list and unusual for JJ but maybe the stress of losing mom had pushed him to his own personal edge. And speaking of mom, let's not forget the accusation of complicity in her death, or the woo-woo shit from the supernatural tag team. Suddenly, it all made sense.

"Oh, you stupid, little nutsack," Tessa muttered as she reached into the open envelope. "Mom left you a note in this thing, didn't she? She told you off for peeking, didn't she?" She was having trouble pulling out the contents, another manila envelope, practically the same size as the one that held it. Tessa was willing to bet a hundred dollars that JJ had panicked and shoved it hastily back in, and now it was stuck.

"You freaked, didn't you, Obi Wan, you prick of unusual size?" She murmured her rage into the still of the room as she continued to tug and wriggle at the trapped packet. "Instead of realizing that mom anticipated your actions, you just decided it was a message from beyond the grave. Woo-woo shit. You dick." The outer envelope gave way along one edge, ripping at the seam and setting the inner envelope free.

There was her mother's handwriting again: 'John Jay Doggett Jr. you leave this alone. It's for your sister!' Sister had been underlined twice. Beneath that sentence was another: 'Remember the tiger.'

Tessa blanched. She'd never forgotten the tiger. She didn't think JJ had either though he probably _wished_ he could. The whole altercation with her brother took on an altogether new and unpleasant aspect. _Of course,_ JJ had been frightened and angry! Bringing up the tiger was a low blow. However, it would also have _guaranteed_ JJ's instant retreat, and mom _knew that_. Tessa could not believe her mother would bring such a weapon to bear just to scare her brother into behaving.

Whatever was in this envelope, Monica Reyes had wanted to make sure that her daughter would be the only one to lay eyes on it. To that end, she had been willing to hurt and alienate her first-born son to ensure it.

Tessa undid the clasp with a care more in line to defusing a bomb than opening a package. She peered inside and saw several sheets of note paper, what looked like an old key, and—her eyes widened as she glimpsed a familiar shape at the bottom of the envelope, something she hadn't seen in years.

"Hey!" All caution forgotten, Tessa tilted the open flap bedward, letting everything spill out onto the mattress. The little gold cross now gleamed at her from the coverlet, its shine mellowed by just a hint of tarnish at the edges. Tessa picked it up with gentle fingers and laid it on her palm.

"I thought I'd lost you," she whispered, running her fingers over the smooth metal again and again. Dana's gift to her. Dana's promise.

Tessa was transported back to that night, twelve years ago, when she'd said goodbye to her best friend. Memory led her to the following morning when she'd found the little pendant on her bed. She remembered wanting so much to wear it, to keep a little bit of Dana with her wherever she went. When she'd asked her mother for a chain, mom said she'd look in her jewelry box for one fine enough to thread through the smallish loop. It had taken mom nearly a week to find a necklace that would fit but when Tessa had gone to get the cross from her hiding place in her bottom drawer it hadn't been there.

Tessa could feel the tears building but she fought them back and swallowed them down. The loss of the little cross had been devastating to her twelve-year-old self. She recalled how she'd endlessly scoured her room for it, under her bed, in every drawer and book shelf, in the pockets of all her clothes, and in every bag she owned. And when had she concluded that JJ had taken it? A telling glance at dinner? Some mocking comment from her then thirteen-year-old brother? That she wasn't so clear on but the result had been forever engraved on her cerebrum. The tiger.

Still holding the gold cross in her left hand, Tessa settled herself on the bed and picked up the first page of note paper with her right. Mom's handwriting, print this time instead of that rollercoaster cursive, greeted her with a familiar tug on her heart. She began to read.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

_My dearest Tessa,_

_First, I want to apologize to you for whatever JJ may have said. I'm sure he must have gone straight to Defcon One and launched all his nukes at you at point-blank range. But I know him, and I know you, and I KNOW that things would have been much worse if he'd seen any of this. You always had the strength and flexibility of mind to persevere under stresses that would have done JJ far more harm. Please forgive me. Once he calms down -- and I promise you that he eventually will -- please ask him to forgive me too. Tell him that I love him dearly and that I never, ever meant to hurt him._

_About the cross: There is nothing that I have ever done in my life that I have regretted more than taking it from you. I wish now that I had spoken to you first, explained why it needed to be hidden. But you were so young in my eyes, too young in my opinion, to keep a secret of such magnitude from your father. Sooner or later he would have heard about it, or (God help me) seen it. If that had happened, there would have been no stopping him from hunting Dana down. I couldn't let that happen, for your father's sake as well as hers._

_I knew she wasn't dead, you see, but she was a very different person after the E-Pandemic. The second abduction changed her. When Mulder wasn't returned, it nearly broke her. Then the Paranormal hearings started in the senate, and that was the final straw._

_You'll know the history better than most people your age, if only because your father and I were part of the X-Files and we never hid that part of our lives from you and JJ. But I can't begin to explain the politics, nor do I want to relive them. Suffice it to say that Dana had felt attacked, and betrayed, and very, very bitter about it all. I think the only times she ever really smiled between 2018 and 2020 was when she held you. She adored you from the moment you were born. I believe she allowed herself to love you without thinking of the past, something she couldn't quite do with your brother. I also believe that's the origin of your mutual pull on each other._

_Just before her final disappearance, Dana asked that I meet with her alone. When I saw how haggard she was, gaunt and haunted looking, I could understand why she didn't want anyone else to see her, but what she shared with me during that last conversation, I couldn't entirely credit, not at the time. I had begged her to come home with me, to stay with John and I, at least for a little while -- I'm certain that she could see it in my face that I thought she was delusional and probably suicidal. She didn't even try to argue, just gave me a key and an address, and then swore me to secrecy. Then she was gone. There was nothing I could do._

_It was easier for your father to believe Dana had died. He was in love with her. You would think I'd be jealous of that, but I'm not, and I never was. I understood how he felt and accepted it. After all, I loved her too. There was something about her that engendered passion in anyone who knew her. You either adored her with all your heart, or despised her with all your being. And I'll admit that it helped knowing that nothing more than friendship would ever develop between them. I'd always known that John would eventually come to me. I'd felt it, right from the start._

_You love her too, Tessa, exactly like your father did. It's why you're planning to track her down. Don't look at my words in that tone of voice, young lady. Language! I can't help laughing as I write this. I know you so well and I know all your arguments (and so many of them would have been your father's arguments too!) but I feel this, and so will you once you get past all the walls you've put around your heart. If you are to have any hope of saving her, you're going to have to pull those walls down and bare your soul._

_Dana is not what you think. She's much, much more. She has abilities that frighten her and I don't think even she knows the limits of what she can do. She doesn't believe that she's human anymore and, if you go through with finding her, it will be up to you to do what I couldn't -- convince her that she's wrong._

_I've left you the key she gave me. You'll find the address in my jewelry box on the dresser. I can't promise you that she'll still be there but it is her last known location._

_I love you so much, my Teresa. I'm proud of you. Don't ever forget that. I wish you all the luck in the world. And, most of all, I wish you happiness. With Dana, or without her, your father and I both wish you happiness._

_Love always,_

_Mom_

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

By the time Tessa finished reading the final page the sun was setting, her stomach was rumbling with hunger, and she'd clutched the pendant in her hand so tightly that its form was embossed into the tender skin there like bloodless stigmata. She'd bear a cross-shaped bruise on her palm for days afterward.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Bright future in Sales" – Fountains of Wayne

                                             "Reuniting the Fleet" (Battlestar Galactica-Season Two Soundtrack) – Bear McCreary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again fellow readers! I want to thank you so much for bearing with me. Unfortunately my office is going through an unexpected move, so I'm barely at home to write at the moment. Believe me, my updates are not coming this slowly for lack of inspiration or desire, but solely because I need at least six hours of sleep to function. Oh, and I also occasionally need food. Yeah. Sorry. I'm weak. *hangs head*
> 
> For all those jonesing for more Scully (myself included): she'll play a major role next chapter.
> 
> And finally, thank you to all those who have left kudos! Please feel free to leave comments as well, if you wish. It would be a pleasure to hear from you. :)


	6. Chapter 5-Run Through the Jungle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tessa and Dana reunite and things get...interesting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello fellow readers. Thank you for putting up with my slow progress and never fear, I will complete it. This entire story has been playing like a movie in my head. I'll have more notes (and a thank you) down at the end.

Route 659 / Gum Spring Road

Prince William County, VA

June 27, 2042 -- 6:36pm

 

Tessa had been driving for nearly two hours. She was somewhere in rural Virginia, headed for a point approximately northwest of Sudley Springs and north of Manassas, and she would have been hopelessly lost if not for Sal. Sal insisted they were close. Tessa had no reason to doubt her.

It was certainly pretty country if a bit remote. Lots of flat fields and open grass land, intermittently populated by horses or cattle, and interspersed by the occasional orchard, but very few people. Hers was the only vehicle on this road at the moment, and sandwiched as she was by a solid wall of trees on one side and bare pasture on the other, she felt like the last person on Earth. And the sun was setting. It did not make for a comfortable drive.

As a born introvert and self-proclaimed loner, it had never occurred to Tessa that she would feel such a lack of human company so keenly until she found herself miles away from the nearest population of any size. For the last hour she'd caught herself anxiously extending her other sense again and again in an effort to pick up a ping from anyone in range.

"Note to self," Tessa commented, her tone uneasy, "Don't marry a farmer. You can't take the solitary confinement."

Sal chimed twice. "I'm not a farmer and you've often said you would marry me if inter-human-AI relationships became a viable option. I wouldn't worry about it," her butter-smooth, contralto female voice replied through the speakers in Tessa's car. Sal managed to sound amused, quite a trick for a GPS. Then again, Sal was also the best GPS money could buy and Tessa had yet to regret her high price tag.

Tessa genuinely loved to drive. Short trips, long ones, even bumper-to-bumper traffic didn't get her down. She was happy when she was behind the wheel. There was just one small problem: she had no direction sense whatsoever and got lost easily if she wasn't in familiar territory. Her solution to this personal Gordian knot was to make sure she always had the most advanced GPS available—enter the Navigator Elite.

Navigator was _the_ brand for technophiles. Their head shop in Austin, Texas, hired software developers and programmers by the bushel and churned out groundbreaking advances every few months with conveyor belt-like regularity. The latest innovation taking the world by storm was Native Response™, a cutting-edge software package that combined speech recognition with multiple deep learning algorithms. Navigator units with Native Response™ installed first learned from, then interacted with the user, and with a startling level of realism. It was the closest thing to artificial intelligence one could get outside of an e-reader or a movie theater.

The sales person had a lot more to say on the subject but his pitch had been wasted on Tessa who'd already done her research. Navigator was head and shoulders above their competitors, offered free map-updates for life and, while other manufacturers forced a direct-vehicle installation on high-end model purchasers, Navigator bucked the trend and _always_ made portable versions of every system they designed. Knowing that her purchase would probably outlast _every_ car she'd ever drive, she appreciated Navigator's forward-thinking outlook and opted for the portable. Sal—named for SAL 9000, HAL 9000's computer twin from the Arthur C. Clarke novel _2010_ —was up and running five minutes after Tessa had left the store.

Sal chimed again. "You're about five minutes from your next turn and you'll be making a left," she told Tessa, her voice projecting reassurance. "If the terrain around here is as flat as my area map indicates, you should actually see it in the distance."

Tessa sharpened her gaze and, sure enough, she _could_ see the intersection ahead. Once again, she thanked the technology gods for GPS turn-by-turn navigation. "You're the best, Sal." She said it with feeling.

"Thank you for saying so, Tessa. I'll remind you of that if you meet any attractive farmers."

Tessa managed a chuckle at Sal's retort but sobered quickly. She was nervous and edgy, and not all of her mood could be credited to the culture shock of a rural environment. She'd been apprehensive about making this trip for weeks, from the moment she'd picked up the aged and tarnished key mom had left her, in fact. It wasn't a _feeling_ , or rather, it wasn't a _warning feeling_ —it was more a sense of something coming, something _building_ around her; a thing that was outside of her control but was, nevertheless, dependent on her to occur.

She'd worked diligently and methodically on the vampire files for fourteen days—far more time than she'd truly needed—gathering detailed observations on vampiric entities while she'd updated and restructured the filing system. It had been difficult for her to readily accept what the evidence within those case files seemed to imply; that there were a great many _kinds_ of vampire, as numerous as there were legends around the globe, and each had traits that differed wildly from each other. There was little consensus. What was worse, Dana didn't seem to match any one vampiric type either.

Mom had said in her letter that Dana wasn't what Tessa thought she was. Well, if Dana wasn't a vampire, _then what the hell was she_? Tessa had spent even more time trying to figure that out, going back and forth between her case notes and every piece of folklore she could get her hands on. Between her own small book collection and her mother's modest library at the house, she was able to cover quite a bit of mythological ground, but her information sources were otherwise woefully restricted. The Internet would once have been her first stop for information but she didn't dare use the web for this. She wouldn't use the public library system either. She couldn't risk using _any_ open data source. To do so would be to risk exposure and she was all but certain now that she was being secretly observed.

Gaining access to the vampire files should not have been so easy. And Tessa had been left alone with them _for weeks_. In the three years she'd been with CPER, she'd gotten to know a few researchers with high security access. She had listened with a sympathetic ear as they bemoaned the need for twice-weekly status updates, groused about their nosy and overly helpful 'research assistants' who they all knew were really just incognito security details, and then there were the quarterly evaluations with the review board, who had final say on all case work and investigations. Each one of them had dreaded the review board—one particular wit and _Battlestar Galactica_ aficionado had dubbed them the Final Five and the moniker had stuck.

Tessa had been given unrestricted access to a high-security area. She had not been asked for a single report. She had been given no security detail of any kind. She hadn't even met the Final Five. None of it added up and it made her very, very jumpy.

For the first time in her young life Tessa felt threatened, honestly and truly vulnerable. She was worried that she might damage her reputation at CPER and sabotage her career. She was afraid of exposing Dana to unwanted scrutiny and doing her friend irreparable harm. Her research into vampires had run her straight into a big, question-mark shaped brick wall that she had no way to get around. She was terrified that, if she persisted in her pursuit, she would be placing her life in danger, with no confirmed way to defend herself and no clear exit strategy. She felt like a blind woman searching for King Charles'* throne room, groping sightlessly through Buckingham Palace with only half a map she could understand while simultaneously trying to avoid detection by the palace guards.

…………………………………………………………………………………………

*In May of 2026, Charles, Prince of Wales, finally ascended to the throne of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, and Head of the Commonwealth after his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, under pressure from Parliament (and, rumor had it, several members of the Royal Family, including Charles himself) conceded to abdicate after celebrating her one hundredth birthday.  During her abdication speech, Elizabeth admitted that, though she still felt fully capable and committed to continuing her rule, "—it's time to let someone else have a go." Her death in 2032 (at age 106) is still a matter of much public scrutiny. The Royal Family's insistence on a private funeral for the beloved, iconic figure and oldest reigning monarch in history, evoked months of public outcry throughout the world and later led to a number of conspiracy theories, including claims that she was a secret EBE, the immortal love child of King Arthur and Merlin, and willingly left Earth to rule over one of the friendly alien factions.

…………………………………………………………………………………………

Monica Reyes, who had lived through such pressures during her time on the X-Files, would certainly have commiserated with her daughter and could possibly have helped Tessa to navigate the waters she was floundering in, but Monica was gone and Tessa had no one else she felt she could trust. With no one to confide in, inadequate information she couldn't rely on, and no way that she could see to plot a safe course, she froze.

What had finally gotten Tessa onto this bleak Virginia road, in spite of it all, was the dream.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

It was pitch black. Tessa couldn't see a thing. She took a deep breath and instantly regretted it. The air was an oppressive miasma of musty humidity, weighing her lungs down with unpleasant heat. The ground she was laying on felt strange. It wasn't wood or concrete. She ran an experimental finger over it and felt grit—packed earth? She could hear soft hissing nearby. Snakes? No, the noise was too consistent. Gas? Maybe.

Her eyes were adjusting to the darkness. She could just make out a bulky, rounded shape to her left with a dim, blue glow emanating from beneath it, giving some of her sight back. That was where the hissing was coming from. Water heater. Was she in a basement? Perspiration was beading her forehead and trickling down her spine. Basements were supposed to be cool; where was all the heat coming from?

There was a humming sound somewhere ahead. Tessa could hear it over the hiss of the water heater. It wasn't constant and it wasn't a single pitch; a high note for a long moment followed by two lower tones in quick succession then back up a little. Not electrical. Musical. Someone was humming a song. Someone was down here with her. Tessa rose and moved toward it.

There was a lot of equipment to maneuver around; large, looming outlines and smaller, hunched forms. A powerful, blue-white radiance lit her way now and she walked faster through the jungle of monolithic cylinders and fat, round tanks. A strong, deep hiss had joined the humming, often overpowering the soft melody.

Tessa could see the hummer now. It was Dana. There was no mistaking that profile brightly illuminated by the white-hot flame of the torch in the woman's hand. Dana wasn't wearing any protective gear, no gloves or goggles. She was welding a thin, copper pipe to a boxy container of some kind. Tessa could see streams of sweat rolling down her friend's alabaster cheeks in the heat.

"Jooooy to the world," Dana was singing to herself as she worked, oblivious to Tessa's wondering eyes. "Aaaall the boys and girls." The tune was only just recognizable, a bare step or two from complete monotone. "Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea, joooy to you and me."

In an abrupt and unexpected shift in perspective, Tessa could _feel_ Dana. She could _feel_ her all-consuming focus on the project at hand, nearly complete. She could _feel_ the hunger the woman was patently ignoring. _I will not feed you. I will not be a part of you. I will not allow you to exist within me. I will not. I will not. I will not_. Dana's mental voice came to Tessa and, with it, a sense of carefully tamped fury. _You will not win. I will not be a part of the darkness. You will die and I will be the one to kill you_.

That wasn't sweat dripping from Dana's chin to the floor. Dana was crying, her mouth twisted into a horrible, grimacing parody of a smile. Tessa could _feel_ the desperate, miserable ache in Dana's chest, her hope for relief, and the knowledge that, this time, it would end. It would be over. All over.

Tessa erupted from sleep screaming Dana's name.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

When the sky had begun to lighten, Tessa placed a call to her mentor at CPER to let him know that she would be taking an unplanned vacation day and making it a long weekend. When he'd asked if anything was wrong, she'd told him most of the truth—that she'd had a very powerful vision, it had upset the hell out of her, she was taking it for a warning, and was heading somewhere quiet for a few days. It was never smart to lie to a PN; they were very good at sniffing out bullshit.

After a small silence he had recommended a weekend in Loudoun County, Virginia. "It's a lovely, quiet drive most of the time though you should expect weekend tourist traffic. Still, it is beautiful country. Good beer, great wine, and some incredible restaurants. Concentrate on Leesburg and Middleburg if you're in the mood to experience a few gastronomic wonders. You are a foodie, yes?"

Tessa could have been knocked over with a feather. She'd pre-programmed Dana's last known address into Sal right after she'd stopped shaking. Sal's route took her through whole swaths of Loudoun County. She managed to stammer an affirmative before the silence got awkward.

"Surprised that I care?" She heard him chuckle. "We all have our favorites, Tessa. You happen to be mine. And, if I may say so, I've been concerned about the workload you'd taken on of late. Considering your recent loss, I'd been planning to insist you take some leave. I'm relieved that I won't have to."

Unexpectedly touched by his sincere good wishes, she'd thanked him for his interest and his concern. She ended the call soon after then spent the remainder of the morning penning a long explanatory letter to JJ. When she was done, she gathered the pages, put them together with mom's final letter to her, and sealed it all in an envelope. On the outside she wrote: 'If you open this before I've been reported missing you're going to feel like shit for no reason and I'm going to be even more pissed then when we last spoke. Don't risk it. I don't want to go to jail for your murder.'

On her way out of the city, Tessa had dropped by Maine Craddock, placing the bulky packet in their safe deposit box. She would have five days to pull it out before JJ found it—unless she _was_ reported missing, of course.

JJ had been visiting the box like clockwork every Thursday—the bank sent her a text notification whenever it was accessed. She knew that JJ would get a text of his own today. She also knew that he would still be angry and defensive about their argument and he would be holding a grudge. It was a given that JJ would do nothing about the box until next Thursday. JJ's pride would not allow him to run to the bank and check the box early because _he_ knew that _she'd_ get a text about it, thus _she'd_ know that _he'd_ been curious, and _she'd_ win. Stupid brother-sister shit? Absolutely. But it was also _convenient_ stupid brother-sister shit. The message on the outside of the envelope was only a little extra insurance, just in case.

She'd done everything she could to prepare for the worst. Now, as she neared her destination, she hoped fervently for the best.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

The final turn-off was so overgrown with shrubbery that Tessa drove by it no less than five times with Sal repeatedly recalculating, turning her around, and stubbornly insisting there was a road there. Tessa was forced to park on the soft shoulder and walk the route with Sal in her hands just to find the elusive path. Afterward, she spent a heart-stopping minute and a half nursing her car through the dark, verdant cavern, praying that she wouldn't break an axle on any unseen pot holes, while close-nit branches protested her forced passage by scraping and beating against the tortured vehicle's hood, roof, and sides. Once past the brush, it was easier going—at least she could see the rutted track she was on. Then the house came into view.

Tessa stared at the dilapidated structure for a long moment her heart pounding in her chest. It was hard to believe anyone could live in such a broken-down wreck of a home. But there was someone in there alright. She could _feel_ it though the presence she sensed was unlike anything she'd ever picked up before. The emanation was muddy, sluggish and—dark was the best word she could come up with; the absence of light.

Gingerly, she climbed onto the porch then made her way to the door, taking good care to test each warped, grey plank before placing her full weight anywhere. She did not want to find herself breaking through a rotten floor board into whatever unspeakable muck had grown beneath. A lot of creaks and groans met her questing feet but no sudden sagging or snapping. Either luck was with her or this place wasn't as decrepit as it looked.

As she slid the key home into the deadbolt, two thoughts occurred to her, one after another: _There's a very good chance Dana's changed the locks since she gave mom this key,_ immediately followed by: _What if it's not Dana I'm picking up in there?_ Tessa gave the key an experimental twist and the lock retracted with a smooth click. Thought number one was a non-issue. As for thought number two—

Dammit, _someone_ was living here. _Someone_ was regularly using the front door or the deadbolt wouldn't have drawn back so easily. If that someone wasn't Dana Scully then there was nothing she could do about it. Dana needed help and this was the only lead Tessa had left. She would either find her friend in here or she wouldn't.

Tessa stepped into the dim interior, pulling a flashlight from her jacket pocket as she let her eyes adjust. Dusk seeped in through the windows touching a few scattered pieces of furniture with its fading glow; a table, a couch, a couple of chairs, but mostly what she saw was empty space. She snapped on her torch and began searching the room for a light switch. She wanted to tiptoe around the place but she resisted the urge. She wasn't a thief and she wasn't committing a crime. There was no need for stealth.

"Besides, I've already broken almost every rule for surviving a horror movie I can think of," Tessa muttered. "So, what's the point?" She spotted a light switch and moved toward it.

"Don't bother."

Tessa swung around fast looking for the owner of that voice.

"The bulbs blew in here and I haven't replaced them."

There was a hall across from the foyer and Dana was standing before it, framed in shadow, her hair disheveled, her clothing pockmarked by burn holes. There were dark smudges under her eyes. She was barefoot.

"Dana—"

"What are you doing here?" The tone of Dana's voice was deceptively casual. Tessa could _feel_ the resentment simmering just beneath her cool façade. She opened her mouth to reply but no sound came out.

"Sit down. Can I get you anything?" Dana crossed the room and disappeared through an open doorway. Tessa could hear muted rustling and thumping, then the tinkling of glass. "I don't have any beer but—"

"I wanted to talk to you," Tessa managed. Her voice sounded tight and unnaturally high to her ears. There was a long silence. Dana came back into view, a bottle in one hand and two short, glass tumblers in the other.

"But I don't want to talk to you," Dana replied, placing the bottle and glasses on the table. "I thought I'd made it very clear during our last meeting that we were to have no further contact."

"I know, but—"

"I don't have the time or the inclination to continue any conversation."

"I understand, but—"

"I don't think you do." Dana lifted the squat, squarish bottle, unscrewed the cap, and poured a finger of golden liquid into each glass. "I'll have one drink with you. Then you'll get into your car and leave." The redhead picked up both glasses and offered one to her.

"I don't drink." It was absolutely the wrong thing to say. Tessa sensed a flare of outrage from the other woman, quickly suppressed. "Wait, I mean—"

"You. Don't. Drink. Really."

"Not exactly, see—"

"Do you think I'm trying to poison you?" That dangerously offhand tone was back in Dana's voice and Tessa was picking up some strange and distracting fluctuations emanating from her. She was finding it hard to concentrate.

"Of course not, Dana—"

"Trying to get you drunk, then?"

"No! Please, let me ex—"

The glass in Dana's outstretched hand exploded like a bomb and the blood in Tessa's veins turned to ice water.

"You ordered a pint of _Guinness_."  Dana's polite expression didn't change but her tone dropped to a menacing rumble. "I pulled your stupid carcass out of a _bar_." She lifted the remaining glass to her lips and knocked its contents back in one swallow. "Do you think I'm an idiot?" The woman was showing her teeth but it was a long way from a smile.

"I would never think that!" Tessa hadn't intended to sound so harsh but she could feel her own ire starting to rise under the unrelenting attacks.

"Then don't you LIE to me!" Dana shouted and threw her glass against the wall behind Tessa. It burst apart, flinging shards and splinters like shrapnel through the room.

"I'M NOT LYING!" Tessa yelled back. "Don't you EVER accuse me of lying! Not when I've lied _for_ you or _about_ you to EVERYONE I'VE EVER KNOWN!!!" When she saw Dana blink in surprise and take an unwilling step backward, the anger that lived within her reveled in it.

For as long as she could remember, Tessa had fought an endless war against her temper. It was a dragon, all teeth and claws and scales and fire, and she was the knight forever charged to tame it. Now the beast had Tessa firmly in its heated grip and she didn't try to take back control. It was a relief to finally let out all the guilt, all the shame, all the bitterness, and yes, all the fear. She let the anger dragon spread its wings and take her. 

"I've lied to my mentor. I've lied to my colleagues. I've lied to every friend I've ever had and I didn't have very many!" Tessa fumed. "I've lied to my brother, to my father, even to my mother, and for what? For you! I did it all for you, Dana!"

"Tessa—"

"Shut up, you've had your turn!" Dana reluctantly closed her mouth and Tessa continued. "You want to know why I said I don't drink? Because I tell _everyone_ I don't drink! It's easier than trying to explain yet another of my never-ending list of fucking annoying, socially awkward quirks. I don't even think about it anymore!" Tessa laughed but the sound held no humor.

"I get headaches when I drink, Dana. Ball busting, nipple twisting headaches that make migraines consider taking up new careers as caregivers to the elderly. I can get a sip or two in, maybe three, but that's all. And do you know what that's like, not being able to do something as _normal_ as have a drink at the end of the day with your coworkers? It bites bull sacks. But hey, I should be used to it by now, right?" Dana winced under Tessa's gimlet stare and the anger dragon roared its satisfaction.

"You don't get to be normal, Tessa. That would be boring!" She ran her hands over her head in her characteristic gesture of frustration. "You know what you get? You get to be part of the Addams Family! Neighbors will whisper behind their hands as you walk down the street with your mom and dad, kids in school will be afraid to play with you, and Halloween will be an adventure in dealing with fucktards every year! Oh, and by the way, you'll _see_ shit all the time! That'll scare practically everyone else away, but that's okay because when you hit puberty and the fucking _feelings_ show up, you'll know better than to open your goddamned mouth!"

"I'm sorry, Tessa," Dana said softly.

"Sorry? You're sorry?!?" Tessa clenched her fists and approached her, taking steady, deliberate steps. The redhead hastily retreated until the table stopped her progress. "Don't you DARE be sorry!" she shrieked into Dana's bewildered face. "Don't you get it yet? It was WORTH IT! BECAUSE OF YOU! YOU MADE IT ALL WORTH IT!"

Tessa felt tears sliding down her face but they were wrath-filled tears, the tears of the anger dragon, and that was okay. "If God showed up right now and told me that I could go back, if He said I could live a completely normal, happy life if I just gave up what I had with you, I'd tell Him to go fuck Himself and every demon in Hell! Twice!" She took a shaky, sobbing breath.

"I love you, okay? You're my best friend, maybe the only real friend I've ever had, and I love you, and you need help. _That's_ what I'm doing here. Because you're trying to kill yourself and I don't understand why and I may not know everything about you but I'd never have pegged you for a coward."

Dana recoiled as if she'd been slapped. "I am _not_ a coward!"

"Then stop acting like one! Stop running from your problem and face it!"

"You pissant little—" Dana clenched her hands on the tabletop and Tessa heard a crack like a gunshot. "My problem? You call _this_ a problem?" Dana reached into the black interior of the doorway she'd brought the bottle and glasses from earlier. There was a low click and yellow light suddenly poured through it.

"I'm seventy-eight years old, Tessa. Do I look it?" Dana pressed on without waiting for a response. "I'm not _aging_. Do you understand that? _I'm not getting older._ Time has ceased to have any meaning for me. I'm _not_ dying while everything and _everyone_ else around me is. I'm a biological impossibility, an aberration. _I should not exist!_ " The woman's eyes flared into brilliant life and it took every ounce of strength Tessa had not to back down from that blazing, fiery gaze.

"Bullshit," Tessa said in the softest voice she could manage and waited for Dana to rip her head off. The seconds ticked by. Her skull was still attached and Dana was staring at her in astonishment. Okay.

"Bullshit," Tessa repeated meeting Dana's eyes and locking with them. Her mother had been right, right about all of it. She _loved_ this woman—loved her the way mom had loved dad—and she wasn't going to let her die. Not alone. Not without a fight. Tessa swallowed her doubt and took a leap of faith.

"I think maybe I knew it all along," Tessa began. "That you weren't a ghost, not really. There was so much _more_ to you than that. But when you're little, grownups are gods, so I let their assumptions be my guide.

"If you had stayed with me, I would have figured it out sooner. I would have _felt_ the difference in you immediately, I'm certain of it." At those words Tessa had a sudden burst of insight and she smacked her forehead with her palm. "You're blocking me, aren't you? That's why I didn't _feel_ you at all before and why you're all muddy now. You're trying to block me out. You don't have to do that."

"Yes, I do," Dana whispered. "I _do_ have to. It's too much when I don't. The thoughts. The emotions. I can't—" Dana's voice cracked and she was trembling visibly. Tessa reached out and took her shoulders in both hands.

"Yes, you can," Tessa insisted. "I'll help you get a hold of it. Or I'll find someone who can. And if I can't—" She hesitated. _Could_ she let Dana go? She'd asked herself that not too long ago and couldn't even stomach the thought. But staring at the woman now, seeing her in pain, feeling her shudder under her hands—if Dana was suffering that much, and it was what Dana wanted, then yes. Yes, she could.

Tessa began to weep in earnest now and the anger dragon, having no more thermals of fury to soar upon, lumbered back into its cave.

"I'll help you to die." Tessa finished with a watery groan. "I'll help you to go so you can be with the people you love. But God, Dana, please—please just give me the chance to save you first!"

Dana dissolved into tears and Tessa wrapped her arms around the other woman, closing the gap between them. After a moment of indecision, Dana's arms did the same, pulling Tessa in close.

They grieved together for a time, Dana quietly keening into Tessa's shoulder as Tessa sobbed against Dana's neck. Then Tessa began thinking at her, projecting wordless messages of reassurance. _You're not alone_ , she sent. _I love you. I'll be here for you. I'll help you. I promise_. Tessa wasn't sure if any of it was reaching her until Dana sent a single, tentative thought back: 'Thank you.'

Dana's hand slipped up to Tessa's cheek and, with a gentle push, turned her face so she could kiss her forehead. Tessa smiled. The last time Dana had kissed her forehead she had been twelve and she'd been crying then too. The woman's eyes were still glowing from within, the wetness on her lashes catching and refracting the blue-green light; dew drops floating above twin pools of phosphorescence. She was so beautiful that Tessa's breath caught in her throat and Dana must have noticed her reaction; there was such a look of dismay on her face.

Tessa shook her head and sighed. _It's okay, don't worry about it_ , she sent. And she meant it. She didn't need anything from Dana that Dana herself wasn't willing to give. Loving her was enough. Being her friend was enough. She leaned in and brushed Dana's lips with a feather-light kiss.

Much later, when Tessa had the presence of mind to analyze the moment—and she would find herself thinking on it often for weeks after—she was positive that her impulsive act had held no ulterior motives. She had meant the kiss as a friendly gesture, nothing more. What it turned into, however, was something else entirely.

Dana's mouth closed on Tessa's lips and the hand that had been on her cheek was now cupped to the back of her neck. Dana's other arm was a vice swathed in cotton, yielding yet inflexible around her waist, pressing Tessa's body to her. Tessa made one futile effort to push Dana away, to stop what was happening, unable to believe that the woman could want this. Then Dana's lips began to move hungrily against hers and Tessa's resolve melted in the heat of their sweet friction.

Tessa felt a swift jerk around her hips and suddenly she couldn't feel the floor under her feet any more. Dana had lifted her without any noticeable effort, cradling her firmly against her chest. These thoughtless acts of strength continued to awe Tessa. She was no light weight and Dana was shorter, with a much lighter frame. Still, here she was being carried in Dana's arms like a newborn.

A thread of concern wormed its way through Tessa's desire and touched her heart with a chill finger. With that kind of power, Dana could do anything to her, anything at all, and Tessa would be helpless. She was instantly soothed by a tender hand stroking her hair. Vulnerable Tessa might be but she was not without defenses—Dana would not do her harm and that was her protection.

Tessa's back came into contact with something wide and plush, and her eyes flew open in startlement—when the hell had Dana moved? It was too dark to register anything other than that they were in a different room and Tessa let her eyes drift shut. Only one sense mattered to her anymore, her sense of touch; the feel of Dana's mouth and hands had become all encompassing.

Dana's lips increased their pressure and Tessa felt moist velvet against her mouth requesting entry. She opened to her and moaned as their tongues entwined. Her every breath came warm from Dana's throat, flavored with a delicate taste she could not describe and would never forget. _I love you so much_ , she thought, tangling her fingers in Dana's glorious, scarlet mane, and filled her lungs with Dana's air once more.

Tessa felt Dana sigh and then the woman's hands were at her wrists, wresting her fingers away and pressing her arms gently but firmly down. Then Dana lifted her mouth from hers and Tessa whimpered her distress.

_Don't stop_ , she sent without thinking.

'I can't,' came the silent reply.

The tip of Dana's Roman nose grazed Tessa's skin tracing the finest of lines down her throat before settling somewhere in the vicinity of Tessa's heaving chest. She whimpered again, this time with pleasure, as the velvet of Dana's tongue stroked her just above the neckline of her blouse. She felt a tug on the fabric at her neck and heard something rip noisily. The unexpected feel of cool, night air on her skin made her gasp. There was a sharp pull near her belly and another loud, ripping sound followed. Dana was tearing off Tessa's clothes—she was _literally ripping them off_.

Too late, Tessa recognized the import of Dana's message. _I can't_ , the woman had sent. Not _I won't,_ or _I don't want to_ but _I can't_. The goosebumps that broke out over her body weren't entirely due to the chill in the air.

'Don't. Fear.' Tessa sensed the effort in Dana's sending. The woman was straining to hold on to—something, keeping it under a very tight rein. Tessa suspected that something was hunger but she wasn't afraid. Even as Dana rent her jeans apart with an audible growl she wasn't frightened though, logically, she knew that she should be. She trusted Dana without reservation. Her concern was for the woman she loved, not for herself.

Dana was lapping at Tessa's inner thighs now, prolonged tongue strokes, first on one side, then the other. Her progress upward was maddeningly slow. Tessa reached for Dana, hoping to speed up the process, but Dana's hands intercepted hers and, once again, pushed her arms up and away. The message was clear: No touching.

Tessa felt a second of hurt at that obvious rejection then Dana's head made a deliberate shift upward and the pain of the woman's rebuff was swept away by a wave of pleasure as Dana pressed a deep kiss to her sensitive folds. Another kiss followed. Then another. Kiss after tender kiss was bestowed on Tessa's worshipful flesh and Dana's mouth was the only benediction she desired.

Tessa could feel her need building quickly, a warm ball of molten bliss swelling deep within her. Her hips rose in entreaty and Dana's lips enfolded her core. Her mouth was moist heat, melting pleasure, silk and velvet in perfect union. Tessa's body could take no more. The ball inside her expanded and burst, engulfing her in orgasm.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Humming. Someone was humming. Tessa came back to herself in gradual increments. She felt lethargic, loathe to move. Her muscles were nothing more than balloons filled with whipped cream attached to the half-set gelatin molds that were her bones. Her body was floating on an ocean of pure contentment. And someone was humming.

The someone was Dana and she was not humming. Dana was purring, a resonating rumble from deep in her throat. The woman's entire frame was vibrating with the sound and Tessa's reverberated in sympathy. Her head was still between Tessa's legs laving her with steady sweeps of her tongue. It was a marvelous sensation. She moaned softly and the tone of Dana's rolling purr rose in response. The rhythmic stroking continued with Dana showing no inclination to stop.

"Dana," Tessa murmured.

The purring ceased. "Mmmmm?"

"If you're trying to—if you want me to—" Tessa was finding it difficult to form a coherent thought. "I need—time. After that. I can't—"

Dana chuckled, "Yes, you can."

Dana's mouth returned to Tessa her lips enveloping her in sweet silk. The purring resumed its muffled cadence. Tessa's mind sank into the rapturous sea. Her body followed soon after.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Tessa lost count of the number of times Dana brought her to fruition. She existed in a timeless state where nothing held meaning for her except the rise and fall of her ecstasy, a euphoria that came and went like the tide. And Dana was the moon who caused that tide to flow and ebb, whose gravitational pull would not be denied.

Time resumed for Tessa when she felt Dana's loving, tender arms wrap around her shoulders and draw her close, the full length of their bodies aligning like puzzle pieces. Dana's long fingers drifted through her sweat-dampened hair, lifting and sifting through the strands, letting cool air reach her scalp and neck. Her head came to rest on Dana's chest, the steady thumping of her powerful heart a comforting timbre beneath her ear. She was somnolent, hardly able to move at all, but she struggled to keep lethargy from claiming her in an effort to reciprocate, to return to Dana even a little of the pleasure she'd been given.

"Shhhh." Dana's hand drew comforting circles on her back.

"But—" Tessa's voice was a barely audible croak. "But—you—didn't—"

"I did, Tessa." Dana followed the reassurance with an outpouring of sensation. Tessa _felt_ Dana's total contentment, her satisfaction, and a sense of utter fulfillment that rivaled her own. "Go to sleep now."

"I love you."

"I know, sweetie."

Tessa fell asleep to the beating of Dana's heart.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Run Through The Jungle" – Credence Clearwater Revival

                                             "Closer" – Nine Inch Nails

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again! There are a couple of scenes that have captured my attention and have pushed me to write this fanfiction, and this is one of those scenes. I've been itching to get to it since I started. :)
> 
> I must give credit and major thanks to corgonin and tent405 on Reddit for pin-pointing the old Mulder home that plays such an important role in this chapter (https://www.reddit.com/r/XFiles/comments/460j7t/where_is_mulders_house/). Without their hard work it would have taken me a lot longer to decide where it should be!
> 
> For anyone who's curious as to what Scully is drinking, I chose Tullamore Dew 12 Year Irish Special Reserve (http://whiskey.underthelabel.com/l/319/Tullamore-Dew-12-Year-Old-Irish-Special-Reserve-Whiskey). My only reason for this is that a) I like the idea that she'd be a whiskey drinker, b) Irish whiskeys are typically smooth with a sweeter flavor, and c) the flavor description of this one sounds like it would appeal to her. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thank you again to all who've left kudos. Please feel free to leave comments as well.


	7. Chapter 6-Eye of the Beholder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Tessa sleeps, Dana mulls over a startling discovery, wrestles with guilt, and reconsiders her current path.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello fellow readers! I hope I haven't lost anyone during my long absence. The break between updates was unavoidable, and I hope you'll forgive me.
> 
> My end notes will have a an interesting inspirational tidbit about this chapter.
> 
> And now, I give you the best apology gift I can give—Scully. <3

Old Mulder Homestead

Prince William County, VA

June 28, 2042 -- 2:07am

 

Beneath the thin, pale light of a waning moon, the old, wood-framed house hunkered on its foundation, brooding under the branches of the elm and beech trees it was surrounded by. Unmoved by neither the reality of night, nor the whispered promise of dawn, the weather-beaten structure maintained a silent, unblinking vigil, guarding all who sheltered within, as it had since its construction.

Upstairs in the master bedroom, Tessa Reyes slept the sleep of the exhausted and sated, oblivious to her surroundings, and Dana Scully leaned against the rooms' single window, keeping her own quiet watch over her.

Dana felt good. She felt calm, in control and, most importantly, clear-headed. She'd been ignoring the discomforts of her body for so long that she'd forgotten what it was like _not_ to suffer their constant presence. She hadn't felt this good in years. But while she welcomed this reprieve from all the persistent reminders of her fall from grace, she was reluctant to admit the reason for their current absence, a reason that presently occupied the bed she'd once shared with Fox Mulder.

In sleep, Tessa looked appallingly young, more like the child Dana remembered than the adult she knew her to be. A little girl. John and Monica's little girl. A little girl that she, Dana, had once played games with, and colored in coloring books with. A little girl, without fear, who had placed her trust in a monster.

A little girl asleep in _her_ bed, wrapped in a sweaty tangle of sheets, in a room still redolent of the sex they'd shared.

Dana didn't want to face the unbelievable truth—it shouldn't have been possible—but there was no ignoring the results. She wasn't on the constant edge of rage or misery, barely holding onto sanity by a thread. She was thinking coherently, with no fog of malaise weighing down her thoughts. She had no uncomfortable emptiness in her belly, no cramping in her gut, no hunger pangs. There was only one cause for her feeling of well-being: the monster had fed.

"And I'm full," she whispered in disbelief. "I'm actually full." Astonishment and guilt warred within her.

On the one hand, Dana's moral compass insisted that she'd perpetrated a near criminal act upon Tessa. She'd _used_ Tessa, ravished her, the youngest child of her two closest friends. If John were still alive, he would have shot her in the stomach, then watched her writhe in agony as she bled out onto the floor. And how would Monica have felt, knowing she'd been so thoroughly betrayed by someone she'd trusted with everything that was most precious to her?  

On the other hand, the logical side of her mind insisted that Tessa had exhibited clear desire and enthusiasm, had enjoyed the sex thoroughly and, barring some soreness, had not sustained any physical injury—and was that not the crux of the matter? That she’d, all unknowing, achieved a _completely bloodless feeding_?

Dana understood blood. There was a substantial amount of information about blood and its four components: plasma, red and white blood cells, and platelets. Far less was known about a woman's sexual secretions other than the general combination of carbohydrates, proteins, amino and other acids it contained. There hadn't been a whole lot of study in the area of female lubrication while she'd been in school, and she'd ceased keeping up with advances in medicine after staging her final disappearance.

From a medical perspective, she recognized that everything in the human body was formed from a finite number of essential building blocks; it was _the way_ those building blocks came together, their molecular compositions, which differentiated each component. Bones, brains, and lungs, for example, all contained proteins, but the make-up of those proteins differed enormously.

Blood plasma and vaginal fluid did share a few of the same base elements. There were several processes and organs involved in the overall formation of vaginal lubrication, but transudation of plasma through the vaginal walls was considered to be the primary source of its production. Was plasma the key?

By what alchemy did blood sustain her? How could female sexual emissions do the same? Was this limited to women only, or would a man's pre-ejaculate or semen feed her as well?

And was she _seriously_ considering intercourse as a _dining option_?

Dana's churning mind turned helplessly to Mulder, the one person on Earth she wished she could talk to, and in the act of contemplation, her old partner was momentarily resurrected.

'Come on, Scully, it's not like you'd be the first. Sexuality permeates all of modern vampire lore, and any number of traditional vampire myths describe them entering into sexual liaisons with the living. If you'd like to refresh your memory on the subject, I can lend you my copy of _Vampire Vixens_. Every scene is based on actual, documented historical events.'

That was Mulder alright, from the barely suppressed amusement in his tone, right down to the porn reference. Dana felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth in spite of the familiar ache in her heart.

The fabrication of her old partner in her head was correct, of course. It wasn't as if she was unaware of the link between sexuality and vampirism, but to her thinking, the connection had always been one step from ludicrous. Clearly there was nothing more to it than a psychological response to sexual repression. Until tonight. Until Tessa.

From her windowsill perch across the room, Dana's luminescent gaze could observe Tessa's steady pulse from the jugular vein at her throat, reassuring her that the woman wasn't dead. She had survived, and would eventually wake, no worse for wear. There was next to no light in the room but that was no hindrance. Her visual acuity, excellent in daylight, was even better in darkness, and anything within her line of sight both sharpened and magnified significantly when her eyes phosphoresced.

As a child, Tessa had loved Dana's glowing eyes, a manifestation the girl had laughingly named 'built-in headlights.' Tessa had never been frightened of it, but Tessa had no awareness of the underlying predatory nature of her radiant sight. Dana hadn't told her. She'd never shared anything about what she had become to the girl, and she was reconsidering the wisdom of her silence now. A little healthy fear might have altered the course of events.

Dana wondered if Tessa was _capable_ of fearing her, if Tessa could grasp _how close she'd come to dying tonight_.

There was no changing the past; one learned from it or suffered its repetition. With that at the forefront of her mind, Dana reviewed the past hours like the surgeon she once was, replaying every action and reaction, analyzing each step objectively to minimize future errors, and achieve the highest rate of success. She would learn from this. For Tessa's sake.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Dana had been semi-conscious in the basement, dozing with her head against the chest freezer that she'd hoped would be her final resting place, when she'd realized that there were sounds coming from above her. She wearily lifted her face and did her best to focus. Creaking footfalls. Someone was on the porch. The low snick of a lock retracting. Someone was opening the front door. _Shit!_

Muzzy-headed as Dana was after nearly thirty-six sleepless hours of work on her project, she was up the staircase like a shot, adrenaline pumping energy through her veins while fury pulsed at her temples. How _dare_ someone break into _her home_?! She was further enflamed by her own carelessness; she should have heard someone approaching the house long before this.

_I've gotten sloppy in my old age_ , she thought as she crept down the pitch black hallway towards her living room.

A beam of bright, yellow light appeared, and then swept in an arc out of Dana's line of sight as the intruder paced about the space. There was no caution, no attempt at quiet. Her eyes flared into eldritch life, triggered by rage at the trespasser's audacity. She was going to rip this bastard apart for invading her sanctuary. She was going to sink her teeth so deeply into his throat, she'd be picking fragments of his spine out of her molars when she was done. Her stomach growled in anticipation.

'Not a thief…not committing a crime...' A fragment of thought jetted across Dana's consciousness, and she shook her head in irritation as a dog might. The rational side of her was disturbed by its familiarity and argued for restraint, but the combined forces of anger and appetite thrust rationality away.

Dana was salivating as her bare feet propelled her across the last remaining inches of the corridor. Scents of citrus and chocolate hovered on the still air. This blood would be sweet and tangy, an appealing combination—too appealing. Criminals and vagrants, as a rule, didn't smell this tempting.

_Stop now!_ screamed her last fragment of sanity. _Take control and think, God dammit!!!_ But that sole voice of reason was insignificant compared to the combined siren call of billions of red blood cells coursing through the warm body exploring her home—

"Besides, I've already broken almost every rule for surviving a horror movie I can think of, so what's the point?"

Dana blinked in surprise. _Is that Tessa?!_ —the aroma of chocolate and citrus tickled her nose again— _Oh my God, it IS Tessa!_ It was the slap in the face that Dana needed. The mad light in her eyes flared briefly then died.

_I almost attacked her. Oh God, I almost killed Tessa. Oh God_.

Dana beat back her hunger and her temper, panic giving her the strength to contain them both. What on earth was Tessa doing here? She pressed stiff fingers against her aching temples. The pressure in her skull made it difficult to think, and she needed to think. How could Tessa have known about this place? And why come all the way out here now? Dana grimaced at the obvious answer. Monica.

_I gave Monica the key,_ Dana rubbed harder at the pulse points on either side of her head _. And she knew where I'd be._ _But what could have possessed her to give that information to Tessa?_ A pointless question, and one she had no way of obtaining the answer to.

_Christ, Monica, I'd kill you if I had the option, but you're dead already_ , Dana thought with an exasperated sigh. _And eating your daughter is not an option, either_.

This was not a situation Dana wanted to deal with in her current state of mind, not when her self-control was shaky at best, but there was no help for it. Tessa was here. Tessa was an innocent. She had to keep Tessa safe.

_Keep it together, Dana_ , she told herself. _Just hold out long enough to get her out of harm's way_. Tessa was moving across the living room, heading for the light switch.

"Don't bother." Dana said aloud. She watched Tessa whip around, the beam of the woman's flashlight slicing through the gloom until it found her at the mouth of the hall. "The bulbs blew in here, and I haven't replaced them."

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

A sound from the bed pulled Dana out of recall. Tessa had rolled onto her side, her body curled inward like a prawn. The murmur of sound repeated—it was Dana's name. _Damn_. This fixation of Tessa's was going to be a problem.

Dana sighed. _I'll just add it to the growing heap of difficulties I seem to be accumulating._ Tessa heaved a sigh in unconscious imitation of her, then grew still.

With silence restored to the bedroom, Dana returned to her dark ruminations. In hindsight, it may well have been wiser if she had run with her first impulse: to tell Tessa where to stick her good intentions. She could have used the impetus of fuming aggression to throw Tessa out on her ass, thus allowing her to retreat back into the basement's womb of serenity. The argument would never have started, she would never have fallen apart, and Tessa would never have embraced her. 'Coulda, shoulda, woulda,' as they used to say.

However, if Dana was to be completely honest with herself, there was no way of guessing what the outcome would have been if she _had_ drop-kicked Tessa through the front door in a fit of pique. For all she knew, the ending could have been far worse, hindsight not always being 20/20 where Tessa was concerned. The girl had a streak of unpredictability that defied logic, an element of impulsiveness she and her father, John Doggett, shared. She stifled a smile, thinking of how that unpredictability had driven Mulder up the wall whenever the two of them had worked together.

'No, it was his lack of fashion sense that drove me up the wall.' Mulder's mental replica quipped in her head. 'I'd always felt he was a little too predictable, personally.'

That was the second time Mulder had spoken to her tonight. _Great, I'm being haunted by the ghost of my partner. Or I've developed schizophrenia. God knows I've exhibited plenty of the other symptoms over the years._

"I miss you, Mulder, you son of a bitch," Dana whispered into the dark. She imagined the house absorbing her message, settling into its aging wood, adding a special patina to each board that her old friend would see and feel. She took comfort in the hope that Mulder would one day return to the home he'd loved. This had been a place of warmth and comfort for him once, and could be again. Wherever Mulder was now, she hoped that he was happy and at peace.

Dana leaned back against the window glass, intending to reengage with her memories—and found that she could not. Her recall of the moments leading up to the argument were clear, but everything afterward, from the argument itself to Tessa's final orgasm, were fragmented like panes of shattered glass. Splinters of time were scattered across the floor of her consciousness, but nothing linear or whole.

The discovery was beyond troubling, it was petrifying. Her mind was her one saving grace, her sole refuge, and her only weapon against total corruption. Once she lost that, she would lose everything that she was. She would devolve into a mindless killing machine, an inhuman organism with no memory and no sense of self—

No, she would _not_ go to pieces. This was one, single incident, and there were mitigating factors involved that could explain the fracturing, starvation being the most obvious. Starvation led to impaired judgement, difficulty concentrating, reduced cognitive ability, confusion, fatigue, mood swings, and memory and recall issues. She'd been exhibiting every other symptom of extreme hunger for nearly a month; how could she believe that her memory _wouldn't_ be affected?

With clear eyes (and a full stomach), Dana recognized the monumental mistake she'd made in choosing to deny herself nourishment so completely and for so long, a decision fueled entirely by guilt.

In saving Tessa's life at that damned bar, she'd slain a murderous bigot and drained him dry. It didn't matter to her conscience that the bastard had killed half a dozen people, or had viciously raped twice that many. It was of no consequence that she was protecting someone she cared for. She had taken a life. Her moral balance had tilted into the negative, and that required punishment. So she'd stopped eating. She told herself that she was weakening her body prior to putting her current plan to end her life into motion. She told herself that, if she were to regain consciousness at some point, this would insure that she'd be unable to get back out of the chest. She'd been deluding herself. And Tessa had nearly perished.

Enough of this. Tessa was _fine_. This constant self-flagellation would solve nothing. It was high time she stopped feeling sorry for herself, and started doing—what? Dana wasn't sure yet.

A jagged flash of memory: Tessa calling her a coward and demanding that she stop running from her problems. Telling her to face them. Harsh but honest. And accurate. Okay, she would stop running from this, starting with Tessa. Full disclosure. She owed it to the girl—no, the woman, Dana corrected herself angrily. Tessa was _not_ a child anymore. Young or not, Tessa was an adult, and the sooner she accepted that, the better.

Dana turned her gaze to the world outside. She needed to replace Tessa's clothes. She also needed to stock the kitchen. _She_ might be full, but Tessa would need a more substantial meal than aged whiskey and ice when she woke. Dawn was still hours away, but there was a twenty-four hour Massiv-Mart a few miles from here. She could run there and be back long before Tessa regained consciousness.

_I'm going to run to Massiv-Mart._ Dana made a face as she rose from her perch on the windowsill. _Only for you, Tess._

"Don't go."

The whisper was so low, Dana nearly missed it as she walked to the door. She slowly turned toward the bed. Tessa's eyes were closed, her eyelids rippling from side to side: she was in REM sleep. The woman's mouth formed another word, a soundless 'Please.'

It didn't mean anything. Tessa was dreaming, that was all. Still, it was hard for Dana to ignore what felt like a plea. She moved to Tessa's side, one hand running over the dark mass of hair at the back of the woman's head. Curiosity and skepticism exchanged words, and curiosity won. A small experiment wouldn't hurt.

_Just a short run_ , she thought, eyes intent on Tessa's face. _I'll be back in twenty minutes, tops_.

"Stay," Tessa whispered an instant later, eliciting a raised eyebrow from Dana. It still didn't mean anything. Did it?

Dana crawled into bed and stretched out beside the sleeping woman—and Tessa's entire body relaxed.

Dana's expression softened. "Alright, I'll stay," she murmured. "But just for a little while. Okay?" The edges of Tessa's lips curled into a smile. Dana's lips answered with a smile of their own.

_An hour_ , Dana decided, smothering a yawn. _Massiv-Mart will still be there in an hour_. _And I could use the nap._ The phosphorescence of her eyes faded to black as her lids closed over them. Her mind was still. She was asleep in thirty seconds. 

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Why" – Annie Lennox

                                             "Savin' Me" – Nickleback

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, glad to see you're still with me. :)
> 
> The concept of sexual secretions as sustenance for vampires is not original. I personally came across it many, many moons ago (almost 20 years ago) in a short story by Katherine V. Forrest titled "Oh Captain, My Captain" - and it's most likely not original to her either - but I'd never intended to use it in this story at all.
> 
> I blame/bless my gay male roommate for bringing the idea back into my head with his incessant are-we-there-yet style needling ("Haven't they had orgasms yet?") and his amusing habit of finding interesting facts about female lubrication on the Internet ("It has less than 5 calories!"). Thank you, sir...yes, they've had orgasms now...no, the story is NOT finished yet...don't you stare at me in THAT tone of voice or I'll hide your coffee.
> 
> And once again, thank you all who have left kudos. I adore you all. If you'd care to leave a comment, please do. :)


	8. Chapter 7-Things Will Never Be the Same

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tessa and Dana deal with the inevitable morning after...sort of.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally a new chapter! Writing this has been one of the few rays of sunlight I've had these past weeks. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Old Mulder Homestead

Prince William County, VA

June 28, 2042 -- 9:11am

 

Dawn, thick, syrupy, and golden poured through the timeworn homestead's second floor bedroom window, the rising sun coating all it touched in warm honey. Within her cocoon of sheets, Tessa began to stir. One arm slid slowly into the light. Her other arm joined it some minutes later. A single leg stretched out from the bottom of the heap. Finally, her head rose, and she emerged yawning.

Two observations tumbled through Tessa's mind as her sleep-clouded eyes took in the room: a) it was a big bed she was laying in, and b) she was alone in it. Her feelings about b) were decidedly mixed. A part of her had hoped for Dana to be beside her when she woke. The two of them needed to discuss last night rationally, hash it all out, and reach an understanding.

However, Tessa's less rational, more selfish side really didn't want to face her friend just now. Her body felt fantastic, flushed with afterglow and marvelously replete. She wanted to revel in this feeling for a little while, but considering how unhappy and guilt-ridden Dana was, dealing with her would kill her buzz.

There was more to that impression than simple logic. The drowsy exhilaration she was trying to enjoy was flaking away like cheap paint, revealing a dark under-layer of pessimism beneath—somber memories of what she could only describe as dream _feelings_. Bleak recollections of Dana thinking the most awful things about herself, the facts in Dana's mind warped into dark, twisted horrors. If that mindset was what she lived with day after day, then no wonder Dana was trying to die.

If these dream _feelings_ of hers were accurate. They could simply be the unpleasant remnants of a nightmare.

Tessa couldn't entirely dismiss that possibility. She had yet to experience anything she could define as a normal _feeling_ from Dana. However, she also couldn't discount what her brain was presenting to her. She wasn't some untrained noob that couldn't distinguish between imagination and reality. There was a flavor to this, an authenticity that was far too similar to the dream vision she'd had of Dana singing to herself as she wept in that stifling, lightless, dirt-floored pit; the vision that had driven her to come here in the first place.

Sleep could be a factor. Their shared telepathy could be a factor. For all Tessa knew, whatever bizarre vampire-shielding Dana put up leaked when the sun went down. It was too damned early to think. Her mouth felt like a desert, her tongue was sandpaper, and she was craving a caffeine fix. She needed a mug of strong coffee to fortify her before attempting any kind of mental heavy lifting.

Tessa sat up, rubbed at her eyes, and ruefully ran a hand over the tangled mess of her hair. Brushing _that_ out was going to be a test of endurance. Except that she didn't have a brush. Or a change of clothes for that matter. She hadn't exactly intended to stay overnight. There was a warm tightening in the area of her groin as she recalled how little her intentions had mattered. How Dana had overwhelmed her with her skilled hands, her delicate touch, her soft and sweetly insistent mouth—

_Really, Tessa??_ She mentally scolded. _Can't you think of something else? Anything else?_

Something else. Right. So the frustrating lump of tissue Tessa had the bad luck to call a brain fixated on the most unpleasant thing it could think of: How fucking quiet it was here. No car horns honked. No engines revved. No traffic zoomed by. No people walked, talked or argued. No children laughed, cried or played. Bird song was all she could hear. Life in the city came with a load of ambient noise that wasn't present in this rural setting.

_So, this is peace, huh?_ Tessa couldn't quite grasp the appeal. The silence might have been mildly attractive if the absence of life wasn't so apparent to her other sense. She couldn't _feel_ anyone in the house or nearby, and animal life didn't ping for her in quite the same way. As a result, she felt horribly isolated. At this moment she would have welcomed the muddy-dark emanation she had received from Dana yesterday, ominous as that _feeling_ was, if only for the reassurance that she wasn't the only person alive.

It occurred to Tessa that Dana must have managed to rebuild her brick wall of a shield, and she winced at the unexpected ache that touched her heart. It hurt to think that Dana chose to block her so completely. The censure felt like a judgment, as if her adult self was unacceptable to Dana in some fundamental way. It was a ridiculous notion with no basis in fact.

She hoped.

Tessa silently reminded herself that Dana said she needed to block. She told herself it was _not_ personal. She argued that she was being irrational. It helped. A little.

She sighed and gave her eyes another brisk rub. Her blissful high was long gone. She might as well let the lady of the house know that her uninvited guest was awake.

"Dana?" Tessa called out. She waited for a couple of minutes. "Dana, I'm up." There was no answer.

Well, this was awkward. For a moment Tessa wasn't sure what to do. Now that she knew this was Dana's home and not some abandoned property, she didn't want to snoop, but if Dana wasn't ready to face her, she didn't want to sit here in post-coital shame purgatory either.

Tessa gathered a sheet around her body and prepared to rise. She wanted, _needed_ to find something to wear. That was goal number one. Any kind of clothing would be preferable to the indignity of remaining naked and wrapped in bed linen. Then she was going to find the kitchen in this place and drink half a gallon of water. _She_ wasn't going to hide in here just because they'd had sex. That thought hurt too. Then it made her angry.

_Screw this shit_. _There's a chest of drawers across from this bed, I'm going to look through them and Dana can hide behind all the walls she wants, invisible or otherwise. It's not like I asked her to take me to bed._

_Did I?_

The devil's advocate in Tessa brought forth an image of her leaning in to kiss Dana. Witness exhibit A.

_But that was NOTHING! It was INNOCENT!_

_Wasn't it?_

Tessa replayed the moment and shook her head in negation. She could not believe a friendly kiss with the barest contact of Dana's lips to her own could have been mistaken for a carnal request. Not when, at the same time, she'd been telling Dana via the conduit of their shared mental rapport that she didn't need anything more than friendship.

No, her little peck could not have been so grossly misinterpreted. Something else must have happened at that instant, some other trigger. So why did she still feel unaccountably guilty?

_No, I refuse to take the blame for this, not until I know more. And I won't know more until I'm dressed._

As she swung her legs over, Tessa got a good look at the nightstand beside the bed. Just an arm's length from her sat a full glass of ice water on a coaster, its tall, slick surface coated with dewy condensation. Her mouth twitched as she watched a single beckoning drop of moisture slip-slide a meandering path down the glass to its base.

Before she could properly think about picking it up, the glass was in Tessa's hand and she was pressing the rim to her lips, swallowing repeatedly as her parched mouth and throat sighed in sweet relief. She'd drained over a third of the water when she noticed a folded slip of paper tucked half under the coaster's rim. As she sipped at what remained in the glass, she tweezed the scrap free with thumb and forefinger, and flipped it open:

_Ran to the store. Be back soon._

_The bathroom is in front of you._

_D._

So, the house _was_ unoccupied. Dana _wasn't_ hiding somewhere afraid to talk to her. She _wasn't_ being kept in post-coital shame purgatory. All of Tessa's assumptions were effectively neutralized by a three sentence note. Hurt, anger and guilt all linked invisible arms, and the trio staggered off to wherever senseless emotions went to die. She now felt nothing but foolish.

"You are a horse's ass, Tessa," she grumbled to the empty room.

"No you're not."

Tessa screeched, starting violently in surprise, and lost her grip on the half full glass. Dana's hand caught it before a single drop could spill. In the blink of an eye the redhead was crouching before her.

"Shit, I'm sorry Tessa." There was mild embarrassment on her upturned face, "I don't mean to keep sneaking up on you like this. I tried to remind myself to make some noise, but I'm not entirely conscious of it, and when I'm home—"

Dana's voice trailed away uncertainly under Tessa's hard stare. Tessa could see her, but couldn't _feel_ anything. The woman was a ghost, less than a ghost; she'd _feel_ a ghost. Like the 3-D representation of Dana Scully in CPER's lobby, the one that tourists orbited around and took pictures with, this Dana kneeling before her was a projection, not a person. An image and nothing more. The wall of invisibility _was_ back up. And the hurt came roaring back.

"Tess—"

Tessa could not handle the gentle regret in Dana's tone. She sprang off the bed, brushing blindly past the woman.

"There's a bathroom in here, right?" Tessa's voice cracked. She cursed its treachery.

"Uh, yeah. It's the door in front of you."

 "Great." Tessa yanked it open and charged in. "Do you have anything I can wear?"

There was a rustling of plastic behind her. Tessa turned to see two bright yellow bags swinging from the inside doorknob. Twin Massiv-Mart logos grinned widely at her, their chubby cheeks and joyfully bared teeth mocking her pain.

"Thanks," she managed and closed the door. She then sat down on the toilet, pressed her hands to her eyes, and ordered herself not to cry.

"Tessa?" The sound of Dana's voice was muffled by the layers of wood between them. Good.

"Don't worry, I'm fine!" she called out as she moved to turn on the bathtub faucet. She didn't want to hear anything Dana had to say at the moment. Not while that fucking shield was up making her an un-person.

Hot water gushed into the tub, clouds of smoky steam quickly filling the small space. Tessa fumbled with the unfamiliar, old-fashioned handle until she figured out how to adjust the water temperature, then she returned to the toilet trying to argue the hurt back down to a manageable level.

Dana had said that she needed to block.

_But she hasn't told me why._

It isn't personal.

_But it sure as hell feels personal._

"Don't think like that, sweetie. It's _not_ just you."

Tessa's head snapped up. Dana was _listening_ to her. She was right outside the bathroom door listening to her _think_! Her anger returned loaded for bear. She leapt up and flung the bathroom door open.

"Don't you dare!" Tessa snarled into Dana's wide eyes. "Don't you DARE read my mind! If _I'm_ not allowed in _your_ head, you're NOT allowed in mine either!"

Tessa slammed the door in Dana's face only to wrench it open an instant later. "And I'm NOT your sweetie!" she yelled. _Now_ she was done. She smashed the door home again then mule kicked it with the bottom of her foot for good measure.

Way to be an adult, Tessa.

_Fuck being an adult._

Still seething, Tessa dropped the bed sheet to the floor, stepped into the tub, and after a bit more fumbling, flipped the handle to activate the shower. The stream that impacted against her body had a force that both surprised and pleased her. The faucet might be an antique but the shower head was not.

Tessa ducked her head and leaned in so the brunt of the spray pounded against her shoulders and back. For close to twenty minutes she stood beneath the relentless pummeling. The heated water soothed her as she bathed, anger slowly draining away, leaving plenty of space for the inevitable shame to flow in.

The attack she'd launched at Dana had been vicious, unnecessarily cruel. Christ, what was _wrong_ with her?

Dana's shield. That impenetrable shell, _that_ was what was wrong.

Tessa hated being startled. That jumping-out-of-one's-skin feeling thrill seekers and horror-film aficionados craved, she despised with every fiber of her being. If she had a dollar for every time JJ had jumped out at her from inside a closet or around a corner, she would have been a millionaire at thirteen. Then somewhere around puberty the _feelings_ had blossomed, and it became impossible to sneak up on her. Her PN abilities weren't spectacular and maybe to most people they weren't the most useful, but she never failed to appreciate the end of frightened surprise.

The blind spot Dana presented to Tessa's other sense was profoundly disturbing. Not only was the woman immensely strong, she could move soundlessly and so swiftly she disappeared from sight. And who knew what other vampiric abilities she had that Tessa _didn't_ know about. The deck was already stacked in the redhead's favor. If she, Tessa, couldn't count on _feeling_ her coming—

And since when did she count on her _feelings_? Had she grown that complacent? Was she being overly dependent on her ability?

Yes. Yes, she was.

Despite the humid warmth that surrounded her, Tessa felt a chill at her realization. She'd made the worst and most life threatening noob mistake, carelessly trusting that her other sense couldn't be circumvented or fooled. It was only dumb luck that her interaction with Dana had made her aware of the blunder. Dealing with a five-foot-three clinically depressed vampire with a doctorate might not be considered risk-free, but no harmful intent had been exhibited either. Compared to some of the truly malicious creatures walking the world, both two- and four-legged, Dana was positively harmless.

_Some friend I am,_ Tessa thought. _I should know better than to lash out at someone who doesn't know how to control her abilities. And to think I could have been dealing with something hungry, bloodthirsty or both with that kind of block. All I seem to do is rip her apart when I should be thanking her. She already thinks she's a monster and I'm only making it worse._

"For my next trick I'll do something simple, like slaughter some baby seals," she murmured.

Tessa looked down at her pruney fingers. Standing under this shower wasn't going to solve her problems or get her any cleaner. She reluctantly shut off the water and climbed out of the tub. After drying herself and wringing her dripping hair with a towel from the towel rack, she dug through the yellow Massiv-Mart bags.

Dana had replaced Tessa's shredded clothing from bra, underwear and socks, to a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. The graphic on the shirt, a circling progress indicator and the phrase 'Sarcastic Comment Loading – Please Wait' in faded white lettering, elicited a weak chuckle from her along with a twinge of remorse; the message was funny, she only wished it weren't so accurate. Dana had also supplied her with an antiperspirant, a brush and comb, a toothbrush, a couple of elastic hair ties, and a leave-in detangling spray.

Tessa slipped into her new outfit and began laboring over her hair. The steady, monotonous work occupied her hands and left her mind free to consider what her next move would be.

_I need to apologize to her and I need to get my temper back under control. Shit, it's not like she's JJ scaring the hell out of me, laughing and running away. She's not an asshole. She may have issues, but so do I._

The comb caught in a particularly nasty tangle. Tessa grimaced as she slowly and painstakingly loosened it.

_She's not the same, neither of us are. I have to remember that. I'm not the kid she remembers, and she's not my ghost-playmate anymore. We're different people now. I can't expect us to just pick up where we left off. And would I really want that if we could? No, I wouldn't. I want to be on equal footing with her. I want her to know me as I am now, and I want to know her. Not the news footage, Internet memes and sound bites, not the dinner-table stories, not the imaginary friend, but the real her._

And what if she doesn't want to reconnect? What if she wants you to go away and stay away?

A good point. Dana had chosen isolation once and could elect to go it alone again. If that was the case, Tessa hoped she could convince her otherwise, at least until she found a way to give Dana some control over her PN talents.

And you might as well admit it to yourself, Tessa. You're also hoping that she'll fall in love with you too.

This time the pained expression on Tessa's face had nothing to do with her hair.

_Hope is all it is. I'm allowed a little hope. I can still face reality. I know that the chances of her reciprocating are—not good. Oh, who am I kidding? They're abysmal. But Dad loved her too, and he survived. He still had her friendship, and mom and a good life. So I won't get the Hollywood happy ending, but I'll have one really good friend. I can live with that._

The delicious odor of frying bacon was the first thing Tessa noticed when she stepped out of the bathroom. The aroma made her stomach sit up and noisily remind her that she hadn't eaten since yesterday afternoon. The next thing she noticed, to her joy, were the presence of her boots beside the bed and her jacket draped across the footboard.

From the notable lack of new footwear in either Massiv-Mart bag, Tessa assumed her shoes had made it through last night unscathed, but she had held out far less hope for the coat, which would have been at ground zero when Dana had—don't think of the way her hands felt; don't think of her mouth on me—disrobed her. She slipped her boots on then picked up the buttery-soft, black leather and hugged it to her chest. The jacket had been her mother's; its loss would have been a blow. She inhaled deeply, savoring its mellow fragrance as she silently thanked whatever deity made the miracle possible.

A sonorous rumble from Tessa's abdomen abruptly recalled her to the here and now. Her belly was stridently demanding that she feed it immediately. Either she ate the meal it was scenting, or she ate the leather in her arms, it wasn't picky. Choose. Now.

Not much of a choice, really. She was sure to find Dana at the center of wherever that wonderful smell was emanating from, and she would apologize for her behavior. Then, if the damage she'd done wasn't irreparable, if Dana could forgive her, maybe they could talk. Over breakfast.

The future was a nebulous fog of possibilities. How she navigated through the haze would be up to Dana.

_But no matter what happens, I will not yell at her again. Never again._

Tessa followed her nose out of the room.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Things Will Never Be the Same (Acoustic)" – Roxette

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My dear fellow readers, I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting this long for an update. My life has gotten...well...interesting and it's not letting up. Additional chapters will come, though far more sluggishly than I want them to for a while. It can't be helped.
> 
> Thank you once again for reading and thank you to all who've left kudos. Please consider leaving a friendly comment as well. I'd enjoy hearing from you. :)


	9. Interlude I-Sleeping Satellite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even in the age of declassification, a secret cabal still operates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just moving the plot along folks. Nothing (much) to see here. ;)

COS-SAT 1013-04260911

Approximately 36,000 kilometers above Earth

June 28, 2042 -- 10:00am

The skies above Earth are littered with old satellites. Literally. Orbital debris or "space junk" counts for 95% of the man-made objects making their way at varying speeds about the planet, and a goodly chunk of those man-made objects are defunct satellites that no longer serve a useful purpose.

There's a running joke among certain alien species that Earth's inhabitants were experimented on for as long as they had been because no one could believe an intelligent life-form would insist in throwing its garbage into orbit. Others comment, not without some irony, that it's an unconscious act of self-defense; what conquering extraterrestrial force would _want_ to take over when faced with the clean-up of so much orbital mess?

One such defunct collection of zero gravity perambulatory flotsam is the Coastal Oceanic Surveyor Satellite array, or COS-SAT. Launched in the early nineties and set in a geostationary high earth orbit, the original purpose of the grouping was to monitor global coastlines and observe how various weather systems affected changes on them. The program ran for twenty-three years, eight years longer than expected, but with the advent of newer satellite systems and more exciting projects, the array was finally relegated to a graveyard orbit and promptly forgotten by everyone—

Technically.

The engineers hired to build the six COS-SAT units never asked why the design schematics included such an oversized fuel capacity, or pointed out that number of solar-cells and multiple redundant systems seemed excessive for the array's estimated lifespan. Being offered a salary well above one's pay grade is known to keep questions and comments to a minimum.

And when the private plane carrying the construction team to Cape Canaveral in Florida to watch COS-SAT's launch crashed on its final approach to Merritt Island Airport, the investigators concluded that unexpected cross-winds combined with pilot error was the cause. A tragic accident. The incinerated builders could not claim otherwise.

Of the twelve research scientists granted a position on the COS-SAT project, only two mentioned having any reservations about the extraordinary power and revolutionary design of the on-board imaging systems on what was essentially a bunch of weather satellites. At least until the first high-resolution shots came in. Afterwards, everyone on the team was far too busy having intellectual orgasms over their findings. Gratitude replaced water-cooler conjecture; gratitude for the consortium of wealthy, private donors whose generous investment made possible the development and inclusion of such an advanced system to the array.

The research team went their separate ways when COS-SAT was finally officially retired in January of 2016. It was a bittersweet parting, with many promises to keep in touch. A final rousing toast was raised to the unseen donors and their contribution to the progress of science. They all contracted the Spartan Virus soon after.

In the devastating aftermath of the E-Pandemic, with so many lives lost, the passing of a dozen eggheads garnered no particular attention at all.

Finding themselves unexpectedly free of their last loose ends earlier than expected and at no additional cost, the consortium elected to accelerate their timeline.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

At precisely 1000 hours Eastern Daylight Time, COS-SAT 1013-04260911 cycled from sleep-mode to stand by. With a barely audible hum, the unit's solar panels tilted to gather the maximum amount of light emitted by the glowing yellow orb at its back. In the cold vacuum of space, it enjoyed the warmth upon its extremities.

The COS-SAT's pleasures were simple ones: the sensation of waking, the light and heat of the bright sun, the anticipation of performing its task, and the comfort that it was completely operational and all of its circuits were functioning perfectly. On a basic level, the satellite understood that one day this would not be so, but that day had not yet dawned. Having been programmed with only a rudimentary understanding of the future, it did not concern itself with things that were yet to come. Now was what mattered, and now was the time to proceed.

If COS-SAT 1013-04260911 could have yawned, it would have, but it had not been built with a mouth. As its powerful camera ran through a series of self-tests, the satellite wondered what having a mouth would be like. Would it enjoy having a morning beverage as it prepared to perform the command sequence? The inhabitants far below seemed to appreciate such things. But they had mouths. Would a 'hot coffee' warm its circuits as well as the sun did? Could imbibing caffeine have been another one of its pleasures?

Ah, the imaging system was online; time to go to work.

Unlike the concept of future time, all six COS-SATs were coded for extreme inquisitiveness. The consortium had unanimously agreed that insatiable curiosity would be a useful trait for a group of machines whose ultimate purpose was to notice and report changes in the terrain they observed. Enjoyment had not been discussed.

The programmer in charge of software development for the COS-SAT array's final upgrade had quietly added the extra lines into a string of long-term diagnostic scans. As a being who had also been coded for extreme inquisitiveness, the writer felt that having curiosity without some satisfaction seemed like a description of one of the lower circles of hell, and believed no decent god—even gods who were really only glorified code-monkeys—would willingly relegate a creation to hell.

The consortium had no reason to fault the inclusion. The system ran better with the combination than without it, and the units had fewer tantrums.

So it was with a sense of contentment that COS-SAT 1013-04260911 turned its camera eye to the first set of coordinates for observation. It needed no coffee, though it did wonder if a 'venti iced skinny hazelnut macchiato' and 'coffee' were really the same thing. No change. Moving on.

A moment's pause to calibrate, and the satellite switched its focus to the next set. Maybe the two beverages were only vaguely related, the way toy poodles were related to wolves through a common ancestor. No change. Moving on.

A minuscule shift to the horizontal axis, and the third set was aligned. It wondered if somewhere in ancient beverage history there might be a coffee-like ancestor—Wait! Possible anomaly detected at 38°50'46.08"N 77°32'32.09"W.

COS-SAT 1013-04260911's speculation on the origin of caffeine species was set aside as it increased magnification on the coordinates. A vehicle. A vehicle had not been sited at this position in 7,392 days. Fascinating! The command sequence relating to documentation of anomalies were very clear. It had no trouble following them. The satellite readied its on-board transmitter.

Within minutes, the COS-SAT's report, complete with high-resolution photographs of the area at several magnification settings, was on its way to the receiver at headquarters. Its receipt would be met by varying degrees of concern and distress on the part of the consortium. Calls would be made. Courses of action would be argued over—and plans would eventually be set in motion.

COS-SAT 1013-04260911 had no awareness of the commotion it had caused. It was not programmed for concern or distress. It felt only the satisfaction of discovery and a job well done. Would this be a good time for a congratulatory coffee? Possibly. If it had a mouth.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Sleeping Satellite" – Tasmin Archer

                                            "Also Sprach Zarathustra (On Accordion)" – Weird Al Yankovic (original music by Richard Strauss)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello fellow readers. I hope this Scully-less interlude was intriguing and not disappointing. The consortium had to be introduced _some time,_ and will go well with the next Scully/Tessa chapter. Trust me. Or throw things. But I hope you won't.
> 
> Thank you for all who have left kudos on this! Please feel free to leave a comment as well if you so desire. :)


	10. Chapter 8-Cause and Effect

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tessa finally gets some breakfast and Dana tells her tale.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New chapter alert: Lots of Scully and plot! Which is the most important? I'll leave that to your discretion, fellow readers. :)
> 
> PS - I felt so...intense feels like the best word, so I'm going with it...intense while writing it. I hope that intensity comes through as you read.

Old Mulder Homestead

Prince William County, VA

June 28, 2042 -- 11:11am

 

Freshly bathed and dressed, Tessa followed the fragrant bouquet of frying bacon out of the bedroom and found herself standing on a loft-like, wood-railed walkway leading to a flight of stairs. In the brightening glow that streamed in through the windows below, she could look down to the couch, table and scattered chairs she dimly remembered from her aborted exploration the dusky evening before; the room where she and Dana had spoken. Where they had fought. Where they had kissed—no, don’t go there. Do _not_ think of that.

In the bright light of day, she could fully appreciate the inside of the old house. It didn't look anywhere near as spooky as it had when she'd first entered. A little worn, a bit dusty, maybe a tad bare, but nothing a good cleaning and some TLC couldn't cure.

As Tessa made her way down to the bottom floor, the beckoning odor of a meal in the making was joined by the tell-tale sound of sizzling. With her stomach crying out to be fed, she moved across the living room. Both sound and scent were emanating from a doorway that she also recalled from yesterday's misadventure; the room from which Dana had retrieved glasses and that bottle of mystery booze. Where the unseen flick of a switch had shed light on Dana's ageless, beautiful face. Where she'd come to the realization that she was in love with Dana—Crap. Don't think of _that_ either.

Tessa fancied she was some sort of bizarre, human-sized bat, using a combination of olfactory and aural senses to find nourishment. Or maybe she was a meal-seeking missile, her food-radar aimed at the trabeation that logic dictated must be a kitchen or pantry. She nearly laughed at the outrageous images her mind was supplying, certain that hunger was causing her strange thoughts and the mild dizziness she was experiencing. She needed to eat. Soon.

Just as Tessa reached the pass-through, Dana stepped out of it, a heaping plate of scrambled eggs in her hands.

"Hey," Dana greeted her with a small smile. The woman stepped around her to the table and placed the dish upon it. "Good timing. The bacon's nearly done."

Tessa's eyes followed Dana back to the sunny little alcove where a huge skillet full of the cured pork was browning on a stove. On the counter next to it was even more food, from pancakes and seasoned red-skin potatoes, to sausage patties and toast. It looked as if she were preparing to feed a Roman legion, not a single house guest. There was something else too, a something Tessa couldn't quite put her finger on. She set the unformed idea aside for the moment, pushing it to the back of her mind to simmer until it was ready.

Dana flipped the strips of searing meat with a deft flick of her wrist. She then hefted a couple of the already served dishes and moved them to the table next to the eggs. "Have a seat while I finish up."

Unbidden came an image of Dana's angry hands on that table last night, and the gunshot-like sound of snapping wood when she'd bared down on it.

 "Um, will the poor, abused thing handle all of that?" Tessa asked with a nervous laugh.

Dana stared down at the table, a perplexed expression on her face. After a second's hesitation, she ran a careful hand over its surface then ducked her head to inspect underneath. "Huh. Snapped a support," Tessa heard her mutter. A moment later she was back in the kitchen, her movement so fast Tessa couldn't follow it. "It'll hold up just fine. Sit."

"I'm sorry, Dana. I didn't mean any of it." Tessa instantly regretted the thoughtless outburst. As apologies went, a ten-year-old would have shown more finesse. _Good job, idiot,_ she thought, her mental tone exasperated. _What are you gonna do next? Ask her not to be mad?_

The redhead had just shifted the crisp bacon to a platter covered in paper-towels and Tessa's impatient stomach groaned its need. "I know sw—" Dana paused, biting back the old term of endearment, "I know. It's okay."

Tessa's heart sank to her ankles.

Dana placed the final dish on the table then gave the wooden surface a gentle pat. "Come and eat before your stomach decides to cede from the union."

As Tessa stared bemused at the mountainous meal spread out before her, the notion that had been lurking at the back of her mind for the past few minutes finally came clear: _They're my favorites. Dana made me all of my favorites_. She was suddenly overwhelmed by a wave of guilt.

Dana regarded Tessa's unhappy face and sighed. "I don't have to read your mind to know how badly you feel, Tess, but I'm asking you to put it aside, sit down, and eat. Please." She took Tessa's hand and gave it a tender squeeze. "This isn't just your friend talking, I'm a concerned physician."

The young woman swallowed hard. _Dammit, you're doing it again, making her feel badly for doing something kind. So quit it! Stop with the emoting and get a grip!_

 "You _should_ be concerned," Tessa intoned mournfully. "If I eat an eighth of this meal, the cholesterol alone will kill me." She caught Dana's eye and offered a tiny smile.

Dana's right eyebrow rose and one side of her mouth followed. "Sit down, smartass," she replied dragging a chair to Tessa's side and pushing her into it. Smartass wasn't sweetie, but it was laced with just as much affection.

"Seriously, I can't possibly eat all of this," Tessa said as she dished a bit of everything onto a plate. Her stomach roared its denial at full volume.

"Don't worry about that." Dana gave Tessa's shoulders a quick pat before heading back to the kitchen. She watched her go wondering if the redhead was intending to eat with her. There really was far too much here for one person. Did Dana still ingest solid foods, or was blood her only sustenance? She considered asking but when the first forkful touched Tessa's tongue all thought took a backseat.

Tessa wolfed down three helpings and was half way through her fourth when she woke from her feeding frenzy. She was flabbergasted by how little was left of the enormous repast; close to two thirds of every dish was gone, presumably down the maw of the recently discovered beast that lived in her gastrointestinal cavity.

"I told you not to worry." Tessa looked up to see Dana observing her from a seat on the other side of the table. "Feeling better?"

After a moment of self-evaluation, Tessa nodded. She did feel better, steadier.

"Good." Dana rose and began taking the remnants back to the kitchen. When Tessa tried to help, the woman gave her an admonishing stare. "Relax and let that meal digest. Your current rate of recovery is remarkable but don't push it."

"Recovery? From what?"

"From last night." Dana was scraping leftovers into plastic zipper bags with her back turned. "I—took a lot out of you."

Tessa held back a laugh. "I'm touched by your concern, Dana, but I have had sex before," Tessa remarked dryly. _Though none of my experiences have ever been so mind-blowing_ , she silently added.

"You're lucky that mind-blowing was all it was."

At those words Tessa's very full stomach abruptly clenched into a cold, slick, nauseated fist. _Jesus Christ, she's still in my head!_ Her gorge tightened with humiliation and the gigantic meal in her gut threatened to make a very messy encore appearance on the table. She forced down several gulps of air in an effort to keep it all down.

Dana's shoulders hunched and her back stiffened. "I'm not _in_ your head, Tessa. _You_ are in _mine_." She half turned, gripping the counter edge as if for support, and Tessa could see discomfort etched in the woman's profile. "I can't shut you out, God knows I've tried."

A tumult of questions roiled through Tessa's mind as she tried to hold onto the contents of her queasy stomach: _Was it always like this for you? Why didn't you tell me? Is anything I think private? _

The pain in Dana's face became more pronounced, her brow furrowing as her fingers pressed into her temples.

_I'm hurting her_. Tessa's realization hit like a freight train. _I'm hurting her just by thinking_. The panic she'd been trying to control broke free, gripping her with its sharp, little terrier teeth, and shaking her mind like a rag. She had to leave. Right now. It was imperative that she get into her car and drive far, far away, get the hell out of Dana's range before she gave the woman a stroke or an embolism or—

"Don't go."

The effort in those two words tore at Tessa's heart. "But I'm hurting you!"

"Not your fault." Dana's tone was strained. The tips of her fingers were reddening with the pressure she was applying to her head. "Calm down. Breathe."

Dana was acting on her own advice, taking long, deep breaths, exhaling each one slowly, through pursed lips. Baffled by the request but too frightened to challenge it, Tessa did her best to do the same, panting and blowing until a single manic phrase leaped into Tessa's mind _: Vampire Lamaze!_

Dana's mouth fell open in disbelief, staring daggers at an equally shocked Tessa, her eyes wide, her lips twitching. Somewhere in the distance a cow mooed. And they both broke into hysterical laughter.

"Lamaze???" Dana exclaimed as she cackled. "Really???"

"It just—it popped into—my head," Tessa guffawed. "I'm sorry!" _Sometimes I really hate my brain_.

"Don't apologize. I'll take it." Dana carelessly tossed the bags of leftovers into her refrigerator and staggered to the table, still chortling. "And don't hate your brain. It broke the cycle of your anxiety better than I did." The redhead flopped back into her chair at the table. "Vampire Lamaze." She uttered a last weak chuckle, leaned her head back, and closed her eyes.

Tessa watched her take a breath. Two. Half a dozen. "Are you okay now?"

"I'm fine," Dana promptly replied. "But no more panic attacks for a while, okay?"

Another few breaths went by. "So panic equals pain?"

"Something like that. Panic, anxiety, fear." Dana rocked her head back and forth on her shoulders then opened her weary eyes. "If I don't keep my mind shielded, it overwhelms me."

"That's no kind of shield if I can penetrate it without trying."

"I told you, I've never been able to keep you out."

"Funny," Tessa said, being very careful to keep her voice light, "I got scared lots of times when we played X-Files together, but I don't recall you ever having to grab onto furniture and puff like a locomotive."

"I know, but it was different then. _I_ was different then. This thing in me wasn't as strong and—"

"Okay, stop," Tessa interrupted. "First off you need to stop defining your abilities that way, as if they were separate or other. This is a _part_ of you. You won't be able to control it if you're unwilling to accept that."

Dana's eyes narrowed, "Don't try to psychoanalyze me, Tessa. What are you now, twenty-four? I'm old enough to be your mother. I'd be old enough to be your _grandmother_ if Monica hadn't had you so late, so save the Tony Robbins pep talk for someone else. What lives inside of me nearly killed you."

"But I'm not dead because _you_ controlled it," Tessa shot back. " _You_ , Dana. That's not psychoanalysis, that's fact." _And who the hell is Tony Robbins?_ The question darted across her consciousness, quickly suppressed.

Dana was shaking her head, "Don’t confuse desperation with control. This thing is evil. You're extraordinarily lucky you're _not_ dead."

At that point Tessa's frustration overflowed. "Goddammit, will you listen to me?" she exclaimed, slamming her hands against the table. "You are NOT evil!  And I should know! It's my job to know!

"You remember CPER, right? That 'college I work for?' Well, that ‘college’ trains and employs more PNs than any other organization in the country. That ‘college’ is one of the few government agencies in the world that actively investigates _all_ global paranormal phenomena, cases that made you and your partners pariahs at the FBI. That ‘college’ protects and rehabilitates over a third of the myth species on this planet, creatures that people believed were evil when they were believed in at all. At CPER, we deal with what you could only tiptoe around. And we're good at it, Dana. _I'm_ good at it. I should be; I've been a PN for most of my damned life!

"God, where do you get off giving me shit about my age? So you're old enough to be my grandmother, so what? The number of years you've lived don't automatically make you smarter or better, and they can't make you wiser if you're a recluse hiding from the world. But if it makes you feel better to call me a child or an infant or a zygote, go ahead, I’ve heard it all before. Your ridicule doesn't negate my abilities or my experience in the Para-Sciences, and experience is what matters here, Methuselah, not how old I am."

Dana dropped her eyes, unable to hold Tessa's fierce glare. "You're right."

The redhead's sudden capitulation rocked Tessa back in her seat. "You—you're agreeing with me?"

"Yes, I am," was Dana's subdued response. "I _have_ been hiding from the world. Worse, I've been trying to escape it altogether. I have no right to criticize you over anything as arbitrary as your age. You _do_ have more experience dealing with the paranormal than I did or ever wanted to, and I never meant to question your capabilities. In my own defense that was my fear for your safety talking. And I should never have belittled the Center the way I did after your mother's funeral. Calling your organization a college was beneath me. I apologize."

"Oh." It was Tessa's turn to drop her gaze. A long pause followed. "You know, I promised myself that I wouldn't yell at you anymore, and here I am doing it again." She reached out a hand to Dana, palm up. "I'm sorry too. Truce?"

"Truce." Dana turned the proffered hand over then laid her own over it. "And you're not the only one going back on a promise. I told myself last night that I owed you the truth. I swore that I would sit you down and tell you the whole story, but I'm finding it a lot harder to do than I expected."

"Well, it would probably help if I weren't exploding in your face all the time," Tessa offered.

"Your temper is a non-issue, Tessa," Dana said with a shrug, "When I think back on what I've been doing, I have to admit I needed someone to give me a good, swift kick in the ass. Believe it or not, I'm actually grateful to you for administering it but," suddenly Dana's blue-green eyes were boring into her. "I wasn't being melodramatic when I said I was concerned about your safety. You're too sympathetic, dangerously sympathetic. I'm concerned that you can't be impartial about me."

Tessa shook her head. "That's FBI agent thinking, law enforcement thinking, but CPER isn't a law enforcement organization. Objectivity isn't a rule. For some PNs, detachment is as impossible as breathing in a vacuum. We're trained to trust our instincts, and every instinct I have insists that you're not a threat. Dangerous? Absolutely. A predator? Certainly. A threat?" She took a deep breath and finished in the gentlest of voices, "No, not a threat. At least not to me."

Dana's gaze softened. "Well, at least you can acknowledge that I'm dangerous, that's something." The woman held up a conciliatory hand as Tessa opened her mouth to argue further. "I'm not going to fight you on this anymore, okay? I'd like to believe you're smart enough to make an informed decision regardless of your rose-colored memories. I'm only asking that you hear me out. Get all the facts first, _before_ you insist on continuing to remain in my life, alright?"

Tessa thought that over. Dana wasn't making an unreasonable request. In fact, what she was suggesting was both practical and infinitely logical. It certainly couldn't hurt to listen to what Dana had to say. At the very least her curiosity about how she'd become a vampire would be assuaged. And the woman had been a medical doctor. Her distorted conclusions aside, there was nothing wrong with her powers of observation. If she, Tessa, could separate the reality from that distortion, it might lead to a way to help her friend.

"Fair enough," she agreed. "I can accept that. But can you accept my choice if I stay? Will you listen to my recommendations on your case, even if they go against your personal beliefs?"

Dana muttered something under her breath that sounded like 'my case, Christ,' and squeezed the bridge of her nose between her thumb, first, and middle fingers. "Tessa, the last thing I want is a case file. What I intend to share with you—"

"I won't reveal a single word to anyone," Tessa interposed before Dana could finish her thought. "And there won't be a case file because I won't be required to open one. CPER employees enjoy certain rights of confidentiality through the PN mandates, which I won't hesitate to exercise. And if I have to, I'll invoke mentor-student privilege. Nothing interferes with a mentor and student, even CPER itself."

Dana's eyebrows rose sharply at that. "You've really thought this through, haven't you?"

Tessa couldn't help a small, smug smile. "I'm a paranormal researcher, Dana. Thinking things through is what I do for a living. You could say it's an occupational hazard."

Dana pressed her hands together as if she were preparing to pray then lowered her head until lips and nose touched her upraised fingers. She was clearly thinking things over and Tessa tried very hard to keep her thoughts on banal subjects as she did so. She wanted this for so many reasons and _not_ thinking about those reasons was difficult. There had to be a way to stay out of Dana's mind or keep her own thoughts private. Sharing a mental link was one thing, but if what Dana claimed was accurate—that she was somehow _always_ in the woman's head—then she was unaware of the contact and that flew in the face of everything she knew about telepathy.

Tessa had done some reading on every known gift, including thought transference, in her youth. Like many adolescent PNs, as her abilities flourished she'd become curious about other talents outside of her own, a curiosity that her mother had shared and encouraged.

According to the literature, a budding telepath's most common problem was 'braking,' the inability to stop sending once they'd started. If she did have a suppressed talent for thought transference, the constant presence of her thoughts inside Dana's mind could constitute a braking issue caused by lack of training, except that psychic transmitters _always_ knew when they were sending.

Telepaths suffered a notable drop in energy when they were engaged with another mind. It wasn't unheard of for a transmitter to feel exhausted after a few minutes of contact. Tessa had no such energy expenditure.

Telepaths experienced a distinctive tactile sense when using their ability, a limbless touching that senders found hard to describe. Tessa couldn't deny that she felt something similar when Dana spoke mind-to-mind with her, but the sensation dissipated whenever Dana broke contact. If she were transmitting all the time, then there wouldn't be any awareness of separation.

Ergo, she wasn't a telepath and this wasn't thought transference. But what else could it be?

"Alright," Dana replied, pulling Tessa from her reflection. "Consider me in agreement for the time being." The redhead then crossed her arms on the tabletop and leaned in. "So Paranormal Researcher Reyes-Doggett, what can you tell me about what is referred to, rather romantically, as 'The Return?'"

"'The Return?'" That was a strange thing to ask about. Dana must certainly know far more about it, being that the ex-agent had been involved.

Tessa inwardly shrugged then began to recite, unconsciously switching to her presentation voice, "That's a reference to the mass return of all abductees at the end of the E-Pandemic. Some 74 million people worldwide, approximately one percent of the global population, were reported abducted at the onset of the pandemic, taken by a collective of friendly alien species working to protect the Earth and its inhabitants from colonization by a hostile race. 'The Return' coincided with 'The Revelation,' another romantic title referring to the disclosure by world leaders that contact had been made with this friendly alien collective."

"Ladies and gentlemen, our tax dollars at work," Dana quipped. "I give you proof that our public schools are a success."

"Hey, you asked," Tessa said in a hurt tone.

"And you channeled your inner history teacher like a pro." Dana sighed and squeezed the bridge of her nose again. "Look, I did say that I was having a hard time talking about this, remember? Snide remarks are a defense mechanism, something I picked up from Mu—my partner. Try not to take the snarky commentary personally." She paused as her expression turned uncertain, "Is snarky still a word?"

"I'm familiar with it, don't worry," Tessa replied, brushing the question aside. Bringing Dana Scully up-to-date on current vocabulary was not on her to-do list. "I appreciate the warning. My loins are now girded, and my inner history teacher is prepped and ready. Please continue."

Tessa was rewarded with a wry smile from the older woman. "So, back to 'The Return.' If our new alien friends were to be believed, everyone taken was brought back, their various genetic enhancements now active and very visible to our standard medical equipment. All the loose ends were neatly tied up with a nice little apology for experimenting on us. Except for one tiny detail; not everyone had been accounted for."

And now it made sense.

In hind sight Tessa should have realized that Fox Mulder, Dana's infamous missing partner, would be at the heart of the matter. His unexplained disappearance had garnered an enormous amount of publicity, with then Special Agent Scully at the forefront of the media blitz. There was extensive social and traditional media coverage, centered mostly on Dana's repeated, impassioned pleas for his return—and later her strident demand for his release—and her equally passionate denouncements of many proposed PN mandates during the Paranormal hearings.

The world was already in an uproar over what they saw as multiple betrayals by their respective governments. Dana Scully was photogenic, well-spoken, educated, a scientist, and with the X-Files now declassified, she had plenty of ammunition to back her claims that she and her missing partner had risked life and limb to fight the conspiracies that had ultimately culminated in the E-Pandemic. She proved to be an overwhelmingly sentimental figure and Fox Mulder became a rallying cry for a population demanding an end to the lies.

The public pressure became so great that multiple investigations were opened. Every agency imaginable got into the act; FBI, CIA, NSA, MI5, SIS, the list was never ending. It didn't matter if the organization in question had anything whatsoever to do with missing persons, or if they had jurisdiction to run such a search. It was either be seen as part of the solution or be labeled as part of the problem, risking a tsunami of backlash impossible to survive unscathed.

So, everybody looked. Yet despite all the resources and man hours, Dana's partner was never found. The man had seemingly vanished off the face of the Earth.

Discovering the last known whereabouts of Fox Mulder rapidly evolved into an urban legend on the scale of finding Amelia Earhart's downed plane or the body of Jimmy Hoffa. If a television network was desperate for ratings, all it had to do was air a 'Missing Mulder' program or announce a new look into the case. No matter how rehashed and tired the information was, the suffering channel would garner an instant ratings boost. Some sadistic bastard even managed to trademark _Where's Mulder?_ then launched a multimillion-dollar e-business selling the slogan on all sorts of items, from t-shirts to shot glasses, printed against a red and white stripped background reminiscent of _Where's Waldo_.

Tessa had been the unfortunate recipient of many an anonymous gag gift from wheresmulder.com until she stopped using Reyes-Doggett as her last name, gaining a measure of anonymity. While she personally found the entire concept of someone profiting from another's misfortune distasteful, her opinion was in the minority; the website and its merchandise were very popular.

All of this flashed through Tessa's mind in less than a second, but when she opened her mouth to respond, she hesitated.

In September of 2019, a day after the PN mandates were passed by congress in a rare, unanimous vote, Dana Scully held a final press conference. In a prepared statement, the woman had icily accused the alien collective of keeping Mulder prisoner for reasons unknown then speculated that maybe the conspiracy of colonization was still alive and well. The results had not been good.

The FBI had had enough of being barbecued over the roaring public-relations fire that one of their own kept squirting with kerosene. Three days after Dana held her press conference, the bureau's director held one of his own, expressing 'deep concern' over the wellbeing of his 'overly strained' agent. He was the picture of sympathy and understanding as he announced a public hearing to determine her overall fitness. In her best interest, of course.

In an unorthodox move, the FBI released Scully's personnel file. Worse, they released Mulder's personnel file as well. Every criticism, every citation, every negative mark made against them, both singly and as a partnership, was now a part of the public record to devastating effect.

With Dana Scully seething under the scrutiny of every media organization that could obtain a space in the press box, the bureau portrayed Mulder as a loose cannon, a man who had risked countless lives (especially Dana's) to further his own personal, paranormal-obsessed agenda. Scully was painted, albeit with a little more compassion, as a young, malleable female agent who had fallen first under Mulder's thrall, then into his bed; in short someone too in love to see anything involving her partner with a clear head.

Mulder was judged harshly in the court of public opinion and no argument Dana made could sway them. Her staunch defense of her partner was generally disregarded as an act of devotion, a lovelorn woman standing by her man regardless of his faults.

Dana Scully's career was in ruins, her name destroyed in professional circles. By Christmas she had been forced into early retirement. If certain higher-ups at the bureau screamed for her head, those demands were summarily silenced by the Office of Professional Responsibility. Dana's image, though tarnished by the hearing, still maintained a majority of public support and OPR did not want to risk a new firestorm with a harsher ousting.

Dana's last public appearance was in January of 2020 when she was awarded with a plaque honoring her decades of service to the American people. The presentation was not televised.

Tessa had no idea if Dana still held to the beliefs that had ultimately led to her well-publicized downfall, but if she did, Dana was _not_ going to like what she, Tessa, had to say about the matter.

"The collective insists that Mulder _was_ brought back, Dana. All the evidence, theirs as well as ours, is conclusive. He _was_ returned." She said it as gently as she could.

"I know. The bastards should have inscribed _that_ on my fucking plaque." Dana growled. She sounded bitterly angry. "And they got what they wanted, didn't they? They were free to make Mulder's work their paranormal bible. Free to use _my_ work for their bigoted new take on Darwin's _Origin of Species_. The inconvenient truths were discarded, just as we were discarded. Oh, brave new world."

Dana rose from the table and began to pace. Tessa watched in silence as the redhead prowled aggressively through the room. "But if I'd known then what I know now, I never would have made that statement. I never would have accused the collective. I sure as hell wouldn't have suggested another conspiracy of colonization. And in hindsight I should have known better.

"They were right, you see. Regardless of the twisted political reasoning, the underhanded methods, they were right. The truth turned out to be so much more straight-forward than I ever could have guessed, and the situation far more complicated." Dana slumped against the far wall and she let her head fall back. There was a muted thump as her skull connected with the old wood. "God help me, I wish I'd blown Ronnie Strickland's head off when I had the chance."

"Wait a minute. Ronnie Strickland?" Tessa was on her feet and facing Dana in an instant. "The _Cheney, Texas incident_ Ronnie Strickland? The Ronnie Strickland whose family was threatening the FBI with a 446-million-dollar lawsuit? _? That_ Ronnie Strickland???"

"And I'll bet he wishes he'd talked to his overly litigious, bloodsucking kinfolk before going off on his little vendetta," Dana muttered.

"But—but why? Why would _he_ turn you into a vampire?!?"

"Oh, he didn't mean for it to happen. What he _wanted_ was to torture and kill me as painfully as possible. Painful he got. _This_ ," Dana gestured deprecatinglyat herself, "was an accident."

"How does one _accidentally_ turn someone else into a vampire?" Tessa asked, dumbfounded.

"By injecting someone who can't die with a mixture of blood samples from several vampire—Subspecies? Types? Races?" Dana shook her head, "I don't know enough about them to be certain. From a biological stand point, I'm not even sure if they should be classified as a genus."

"You mean you were immortal _before_ you became a vampire?" There was a wobbling in Tessa's knees and she grabbed onto her chair to keep steady.

Tessa thought she had been ready for anything. In her relatively short life, she'd already experienced more than her share of bizarre happenings. She honestly believed she had long since been inoculated against shock. Until this.

Ronnie Strickland had tortured and tried to kill Dana, who was somehow incapable of dying, and her immortality preceded the vampirism which she'd developed accidentally? The casual verification that there _was_ more than one type of vampire seemed insignificant by comparison. If her mentor were here, he would have laughed and repeated what he told her on her first day at CPER: Never presume there are no surprises left in this world. It's when you think you've seen it all that God really drops the anvil on your head.

Dana made a move to approach her. "Sit down before you fall down, Tessa."

"No!" Tessa took a firmer grip on the chair frame and waved her back. "No, I'm fine."

Dana reluctantly settled against the wall once again. "And I thought _I_ was stubborn."

"Who do you think I picked it up from," was Tessa's sharp retort. "And you're avoiding the question."

"I'm really not," the redhead replied. "My current state of being is a bit of a distraction from the larger issue."

"The larger issue being what? You think _Ronnie_ killed Mulder? Revenge of the Teenage Slacker Vampire?" The words spilled out before Tessa could catch them and she watched with dawning horror as Dana's blue-green eyes filled with pain.

That was _exactly_ what the ex-agent thought. And she was certainly right. After all, she was living a vampiric existence against her will because Ronnie had tried and failed to kill her. What more proof did Dana need?

_And I cracked a joke about it. I joked about Mulder's death. Her partner. The man she loved._

"Oh fuck. Oh shit. Oh God, Dana. Oh Jesus." Every 'oh' Tessa uttered was a step until she was close enough to wrap her arms around the redhead. She half expected a rebuff but the woman returned her embrace without hesitation. "Dana, I'm so, so sorry. I didn't mean it like that. I didn't—I couldn't—"

"Hush, it's alright," Dana's husky voice whispered. Her chin came to rest on Tessa's shoulder. "I know you didn't mean anything by it."

"That's—that's so—Oh God." Tessa was rendered speechless. How had Dana survived with any sanity at all, living all these years in seclusion, knowing that Mulder had been brutally murdered and that his killer would never be brought to justice? She couldn't imagine anything worse.

 "Actually, I can't be sure if he _is_ dead, Tessa. That's _a lot_ worse." For the second time in as many days, Dana began to weep.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

They sat on Dana's faded couch and talked for hours. Correction: Dana had talked and Tessa had mostly listened, a rapt audience of one. The woman had not been exaggerating; the situation _was_ complicated. _Very_ complicated.

"When vampire blood is introduced into the human blood stream it acts like a virus, with the invading vampire cells attaching themselves to neutrophils, the most common white blood cell found in the body," Dana explained. "Then the replication process begins.  It's a lysogenic cycle; they don't destroy the host cells, though the progression from infection to duplication looks a lot more like amoebic cell division than viral budding.

"But it seems vampire blood differs from type to type within their species. Now keep in mind that I'm simplifying for descriptive purposes here. My theories aside, I'm not sure if these beings are related to each other in any fundamental way because if you put samples of blood from two or more vampire types together, they separate into layers. Like oil and water, they don't mix. Give them a shake and they'll just separate again. I can't think of any other example in nature where this happens. The disparate blood types don't combine, nor do they interact in any way until you introduce them into a possible host.

"Once injected into a body, they all swarm the neutrophils, each type desperately trying to out-reproduce the others. The resulting infected neutrophils then aggressively hunt down and destroy _any_ cell that doesn't match their exact cellular composition, including that of bone and tissue. Like berserkers on a battlefield, they kill everything in sight that isn't one of their own. The result is a total breakdown of the host body, with death occurring no more than twenty-eight hours after the blood cocktail's initial introduction. The entire process is surprisingly rapid considering.

"Except in my body the infected neutrophils seem to have ceased attacking altogether. Whether this is because my active alien physiology is acting as a sort of calmative or simply because my system never completely collapsed giving the infected cells enough time to learn how to coexist, I don't know, and neither do they."

According to Dana, vampires were an extremely territorial species, nationalistic almost to the point of xenophobia. Each type was led by a group of vampire ‘elders’ whose every decision was based on a strict set of moral, philosophical and political tenets that left little room for divergence. Ronnie Strickland’s unsanctioned act of vengeance on her and Mulder had resulted in harsh censure and presumably even harsher punishment from these elders, but the damage had already been done. She was still alive and irrevocably changed.

Having the blood of multiple vampire types within her and a combination of abilities they'd never seen before in a single entity of their kind, Dana defied categorization not only within their dogmatic code of belief but within the species itself. That alone would have made her an offensive deviation, something that needed to be immediately destroyed.

"But they couldn't kill me, no matter how they tried. I think that's what terrified them the most."

The offhand comment had sent chills down Tessa's spine; it inferred that Ronnie the vampire pizza boy had not been the only one who’d attempted to end Dana’s life. She fought down her vivid imagination and did not ask for details. Neither did the woman offer them.

Dana did, however, mention that vampires weren't ageless or immortal. The myths they had propagated about their undying nature were outright falsehoods. Like every other life form on Earth, they too had an average lifespan. How long they lived was open to speculation, but circumstances strongly indicated at least two hundred fifty years, far longer than any human.

"That I had the audacity to live through this was bad enough,” Dana murmured. “That I'd almost certainly outlive them all was intolerable to them.

Unable to accept her, incapable of destroying her, the vampire elders decided to exile her.

"I was dumped in the desert, in the middle of nowhere," Dana stated with a harsh sigh. "I had no idea where I was. I didn't know what I was doing. I was ravenous but nothing I ate satisfied. I was being bombarded by all sorts of sensory and extrasensory input that I couldn't sort through or wall out. I wandered around aimlessly, completely disoriented, unable to think. Those first few days I came very close to burying myself in the deepest hole in the sand I could dig just to escape. It's all too possible that the elders' had expected me to eventually succumb to self-entombment rather than keep going. But if that was their reasoning, then they didn't bargain for my stubborn streak. Or you." She had an odd look on her face that Tessa was unsure how to interpret.

"I’ll never forget the first time I felt you in my mind, Tess. I had been catching small animals, mainly rodents and lizards, drinking their blood, devouring the rest and slowly starving. I'd managed to avoid populated areas, though don't ask me how." Dana shut her eyes at the memory. "One evening I found myself standing in front of a house and I didn’t know how I got there. I could hear the people inside, hear their hearts beating over their conversation. And I could _smell_ them, their food, their blood. I tried to turn away, but the scents coming from that home—" The woman's visibly trembling hands gripped her thighs, and Tessa was torn between wanting to reach out and keeping still for fear of causing her friend more pain.

"I couldn't fight the hunger anymore. I was reaching for the doorknob when the screaming started. At first I thought someone inside the house had spotted me but I realized fairly quickly that the screams were in my head, not in my ears. It was you." Dana uttered a watery chuckle. "God, you were so loud, and you wouldn't shut up! Every time you cried out, it felt like an icepick was being rammed into my frontal lobe. I bolted from the place as fast as my feet could take me, which I was surprised to discover was pretty damned fast."

"I'd apologize for hurting you, but considering the alternative, I'm not sure if I should," Tessa said softly.

"Don't you dare," Dana replied. "You saved that family. You overcame all the other senses I'd been drowning in. You woke me up and gave me the focus I needed to get home."

As John and Monica, her erstwhile partners, tried (and repeatedly failed) to calm their shrieking, infant daughter, Dana made her way back to DC only to discover that she couldn't remain in the heavily populated city. She was not able to tolerate the mental stress caused by all those minds nor could she stand the mouthwatering scent of all the plasma-filled bodies. She hastily retreated to the relative isolation of Mulder's farm house in Prince William County, the same house she'd once called home when they had been a couple.

"Once I had enough of a hold on myself, I reached out to your mother. I tried to explain what had happened, what had been done to me, but I don't think I was very successful in getting Monica to understand. I was still too unstable, too confused about what I was becoming, and too afraid of Ronnie and the other vampires. So, I decided to disappear for good. And I've been here ever since."

"Are you still afraid?" Tessa asked into the lengthy silence that followed. "Do you think they'd come after you if they found out you're—still going?" She'd nearly said 'still alive' but autocorrected at the last second. Dana couldn't die and the vampires knew it. To them it wouldn't be her continued life that mattered but her conscious functionality. 

"That was never a concern," Dana responded looking distraught. "What can they do to me that they haven't done already? No Tessa, I'm not afraid for myself." In the lengthening shadows of the afternoon, as Dana turned to face Tessa's gaze full on, the woman's eyes seemed to have disappeared from her face, leaving only deep sockets filled with darkness. "It's you and JJ I'm afraid they'll come for."

All in all, complicated was a colossal understatement.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Teotihuacan" (The X-Files: The Album - Fight The Future) – Noel Gallagher

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, fellow readers, the plot thickens (with a package of chickens)! That's a Dr. Demento parody song reference that I expect no one to know. ;)
> 
> I've been chomping at the bit to get to this chapter. Scully's (and consequently Mulder's) post X-Files Revival history (at least in my headspace) and how she ultimately became what she is now has been a big driving force for me, and it's a relief to finally be able to share most of it with you.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter. As always, I want to thank everyone who has left kudos. Each one gives me a little thrill of joy. I adore you all. Also, please consider leaving a comment if you'd like. I appreciate the encouragement. :)


	11. Chapter 9-Under the Dome

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With a little help from a colleague, Tessa gains some much-needed insight that results in an important breakthrough for Dana, but she soon learns that this discovery comes with a high price tag, and Dana may not be willing to pay it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! No, I'm not dead, and yes, I'm still writing. This story keeps me sane when the world wants to drive me noisily mad. So, keeping that in mind, please enjoy this tumultuous three-part chapter.
> 
> PS - Scully enclosed. :)

Centers for Paranormal & Extraterrestrial Research

Washington, DC

August 1, 2042 -- 10:00am

 

The dog days of summer were drawing to a close, regardless of what the heat index told a body. Record temperatures combined with unseasonal humidity had made for a stiflingly warm season. With several more weeks to go before the implied relief of fall, the population of Washington DC felt like over-cooked pasta, their melting pot of a city set to simmer by an absent-minded chef and promptly forgotten on his celestial burner.

Tessa Reyes took no notice of the oppressive heat; she was too obsessed to care. Over the past month, she'd spent as much time with Dana Scully as the older woman would allow, probing for details on her post-Return adjustment, grilling her on what she could recall about the fuzzy, desert-wandering period after her vampiric conversion, and asking her to detail her experiences with her burgeoning powers. When she wasn't with Dana she was at CPER trying to form a cohesive picture from all of the disparate information she had. She was a woman driven with a single goal: answers.

It had started with a simple PN assessment, a home test meant for parents to detect where on the PN spectrum an adolescent's talents were developing. Tessa had administered the test, stared at the readout in disbelief and tried again. She repeated the scan three more times, each resulting in the same ridiculous calculation. A diagnostic on the hand-held device came up error free. After a successful self-test, she turned back to her patiently waiting subject and scanned her a final time. There was no arguing with the evaluation: Dana registered on _all six_ levels of the spectrum.

A 'standard' PN came with two active gifts. Bi-talents, as they'd come to be known, were as common as table salt on the psychic ability bell curve. Tri- and quad-talents also emerged regularly but weren't as numerous. Someone with a single ability, or a unicorn—the misnomer being inevitably more popular with the public than uni-talent—was an unusual occurrence among PNs and were highly sought after by medical facilities researching psychic phenomena and the brain. Then there was the rarest PN of all, a quin-talent. Current data presumed that a handful of five-talent PNs were born in every generation but most didn't survive past puberty, the time in a child's life when gifts most often begin to manifest.

Quin-talents were unstable, prone to psychosis and suicide; the weight of five gifts apparently strained the human mind to its perceived limits. Some species in the alien collective displayed higher psychic capacity but their brains were structured differently, with an increased neuron to glial cell ratio better equipped to handle such complex neuro-chemical processes. No earth-bound hominid had yet appeared with more than five abilities, except Dana's assessment insinuated that she had to have six. At least six.

Tessa didn't want to feed into Dana's misguided conviction that she was no longer human, but the PN was at a loss to explain how else Dana could score across the full spectrum. Dana offered a reasonable theory, speculating that a gradual cohesion of her activated alien genes with the injected vampire cells was taking place and the integration could be acting as a boosting agent to her cerebral function. Unfortunately, there was a limit to the type of equipment her credentials as a physician could procure for her home lab and size was a restriction.  Without a PET scan or MRI there was no hard evidence to build on.

Whatever the root cause was, a surfeit of psychic abilities was the end product, abilities Dana had no real understanding of and little control over. That it was Tessa who had undertaken the monumental task of training her was not without some irony.

Tessa had never undergone regimented schooling of her gifts. Her mother refused to subject her to any of the so-called paranormal training facilities that had flowered across the country after the PN mandates were signed into law, a stance that her father also embraced. For John Doggett and Monica Reyes, too many of their X-File cases involved the unfortunate results of experimental military programs and neither one would ever forget Knowle Rohrer or the super-soldiers. Unwilling to entirely trust this new 'conspiracy-free' government or its interest in documenting the paranormal population, her parents called in every favor they had to obtain permission to home-train.

Monica's instinctive, perception-based teaching methods worked well with her creative and intuitive daughter, but for a literal, disciplined thinker like Dana, an unregimented program was doomed to fail. Tessa needed an organized course and CPER was the ideal place to develop one. At CPER she could openly converse with other PNs about how they learned to use their gifts, and there was a plethora of talent summaries and training manuals to pore over, which she did, often until well after closing. She was learning more about talent guidance and mentoring than she ever wanted to know, but she was beginning to realize that all the books and anecdotes in the world would get her nowhere if her student wasn’t cooperative.

Dana's bizarre shielding, what Tessa used to think of as the wall of invisibility, was a mental image. Dana imagined a protective barrier around her mind, a cupola built of rebar and concrete, seamless, airtight, and impossible to penetrate. How a simple visualization technique was capable of masking Dana so completely was another mystery the puzzled PN could not explain. The thing was not an invisible wall, it was a dome that had more in common with a mental block than a psychic shield—and the woman refused to lower it. While Dana held to the image, Tessa had no foothold to gain any solid information on her powers and she had no way of training her.

Tessa was consumed by the problem. She stopped going out and what little social life she had withered. She often forgot to eat. She was losing weight and wasn’t sleeping well. Concentration on any other subject was difficult. She knew her fixation was unhealthy but she was too stubborn to step away. There was small but insistent voice in the back of her head claiming that the answer was _right in front of her_ and if she concentrated _just a little harder_ she would see it.

That voice was silenced when she received a text from Liam Hale, her mentor, asking for a private meeting with her.

Unlike her semi-clandestine search through the vampire files, Tessa couldn't keep this investigation to herself. She needed input from other PNs and access to CPERs expansive database of material. Her actions were bound to get some attention from her superiors but there was no other option in this case but to act aboveboard, or as aboveboard as one could be while trying to secretly train an alien-vampire hybrid as obstinate as Dana was.

 _Mom should have warned me that being in love with her ex-partner would also involve wanting to strangle her on a semi-regular basis, s_ he thought as Liam ushered her with genteel grace into his office. She smiled back at the older man and silently anchored her thoughts as she took a seat at the foot of his desk. _I'm ready for this. I can protect her. I will protect her._

"So, how goes the vampire hunting?" he asked then chuckled when Tessa rolled her eyes in an exaggerated show of exasperation. He stepped to his own chair on the opposite side and settled his lanky frame down with nary a whisper from the pneumatic cylinder. "You haven't set foot in the file room since you completed the restructuring. The board asked that I pass along their appreciation for the extra time you put into that undertaking, by the way."

"It would have slowed me down if I hadn't," Tessa said with a shrug that she hoped appeared nonchalant. "My search would have taken longer otherwise. I don't like wasting time, you know that, sir."

Liam nodded his understanding then brushed a lock of salt-and-pepper hair out of his eyes. "And did you find what you were looking for?"

"Not exactly," she hedged. The older man watched her, his gaze mildly expectant. She sighed and continued. "I found the files in question and gathered the information I needed but it was a dead end."

"In other words, a waste of time?"

Tessa opened her mouth to reply, closed it, gathered herself and jumped. "My outline—it was a red herring, sir. I was curious, plain and simple. I honestly didn't think anyone would let me in there without a ton of red tape anyway, so—" Her mentor's sudden outburst of laughter was an unexpected distraction. "Why is that funny?"

"Dear God, Tessa," he said once he regained his composure. "The way you _admitted_ to being curious, as if you were confessing a _crime_! I couldn't help myself." He leaned forward, placed his elbows down on the chestnut desktop and linked his fingers. "We're all curious, dear. Why else would we choose to work in this field?" He quirked his head to one side and regarded her with a smile. "But while we're coming clean about things, I have a confession of my own—I knew your research was a cover. I arranged the access anyway."

"You!" Tessa's eyes widened at the revelation. "You pushed the access upgrade through? How did you _do_ that? _Why_?"

"The how is unimportant. As to the why, it's simple really. I've been waiting for your interest in vampires to surface practically since you got here."

"Sir?"

"Liam. If we're professing our sins, let's dispense with the formalities."

"Sir—"

"Liam," he insisted. "Try it."

"Alright—Liam," Tessa stressed the name and eyed him warily. "Would you care to explain _why_ you expected my interest in vampires?"

"Because you haven't been secretive about your interest in every _other_ myth species CPER has to offer. Your inquiry into possible communication among the fluke worm hybrids, for example—"

"All I did was suggest the possibility to a couple of people. I'd come across a bunch of articles on the net about a proposed link between chemical secretions and communication in trematodes—"

"Your self-depreciation tactics may have worked with the program's zoologists but it doesn't fly with your mentor." Liam's eyes flashed with challenge though his pleasant smile never faltered. "You searched for that information with a _will_. You hated that the fluke-hybrids were being kept in those isolation tanks. It infuriated you that they were being treated like, and I'm quoting directly from your white paper here, 'zoo animals in the early years of the twentieth century, where simple ignorance dictated that they were only dumb beasts.' At times, you sounded more like a civil rights protester than a researcher."

Tessa held eye contact with her mentor through force of will alone and said nothing. This meeting was not going in the direction she'd expected, but she knew that if she forced a course correction now, he'd be sure to see through it. She had to ride the current of this conversation until it carried them to a segue she could use.

The man expelled a harsh sigh at Tessa's stoic demeanor and continued. "You've been quite the vocal proponent of interspecies dialogue, you're insightful and you're fearless. I simply followed the path of least resistance to its most logical conclusion. Which is why I'm surprised at your sudden lack of interest. This isn't like you."

"I've been busy, sir—Liam," Tessa corrected hastily.

"I'm certain you have been. First the loss of your mother, then the split with your brother, that vision of yours last month, and now this new focus." Liam paused thoughtfully, lowering his lips to his interlaced fingers and closing his eyes. The gesture was so eerily reminiscent of Dana, a posture and attitude she had taken so often in their conversations together that, for one unnerving moment, Tessa saw the woman's face projected over his.

Tessa blinked and the odd sight thankfully vanished. This was the opportunity she'd been waiting for. She needed her wits about her if she was going to take advantage of it. "I'm trying to help someone," she said.

"No, you're trying to _train_ someone." There was no masking the accusation in his voice.

_Here we go._

Tessa lowered her eyes, paused for effect and nodded. "And I'm lost. I need guidance, sir."

"But why, Tessa? You've never shown any aptitude for teaching and you must know that you're not ready to enter into a mentorship yet."

"Because I'm all the family she has left. There's no one else."

Liam gave Tessa a hard stare. "She's family?"

Tessa nodded once again, avoiding his intense glare. She _did_ think of Dana as family, but it was too close to an untruth to maintain eye contact.

 _Come on. You know my Mexican background. Come on, take the bait. Please._ She could hear Liam's antique desk clock ticking like a metronome in the silence of the room. In an age where everyone else used digital means to tell time, he was the only person she knew who owned such an archaic, noisy item.

"Oh Hell," Liam groaned. Tessa held her breath. "Please, _please_ don't tell me that she's undocumented."

"Okay, I won't." _Gotcha._

"Jesus Christ, Tessa!" The man leapt to his feet so fast his chair spun into the far wall. "Trying to hide an undocumented, rogue paranormal? Are you _insane_?"

"Do you think I have a choice?" she shot back heatedly. " _She's_ the one that's hiding, I can't convince her to come in, and since she's over-age her status as a PN is moot anyway."

"How old?"

"Nearly eighty." _Seventy-eight counts as nearly eighty, right?_

Liam had his back turned, gripping the frame of his little window with both hands. Tessa could see his shoulders working under the cobalt-blue fabric of his shirt. "Tell me. Everything."

She ran down the details of Dana's case just as she had mentally rehearsed it a hundred times before, adroitly sidestepping certain inconvenient details like the full spectrum PN assessment, the vampirism and the un-aging immortality. Liam did not request a name; it was clear he'd chosen to honor her implied request for anonymity. The questions he did pose were mainly about her pseudo-student's exhibited powers. She answered them to the best of her ability.

"I wish I could tell you more but that damned dome-block she puts up is impossible to get around," Tessa admitted.

"Not exactly," her mentor commented wryly. "According to her, you've been breaching it since you were an infant."

"But I don't know how to do it consciously," she grumbled. "I'm not sure how I'm doing it _unconsciously_."

"Rest assured that you're not doing it telepathically." From the amusement in his tone, Liam's good humor was reasserting itself. He turned to face her and leaned back against the thick glass of his tiny view. "Take it from someone who's in a position to know, you are _not_ a transmitter." His expression turned pensive.

"What you have is a three-fold problem, Tessa. First, you don't have enough life experience to be a proper mentor to this woman. Being an older relation, she naturally assumes the position of authority. You'll have to constantly challenge her for dominance, not exactly a favorable training environment. And you're a novice. You don't let an untried beginner ride solo on a boss mare."

"She's not a thoroughbred and I'm not planning to run her in the Kentucky Derby," Tessa remarked acidly. Liam grew up on a ranch and trained horses before he trained PNs. Accustomed as she was to his equine-themed references they irritated her now. "She's a human being. She can listen to reason."

The older man gave her a look that spoke volumes then moved on. "Your second hurdle is that inordinately strong visual shield of hers, which ties into your third bit of trouble, finding her cornerstone."

"Her what?"

"Her primary ability," he answered. "Trainers call it the cornerstone because of how a paranormal's other gifts seem to both balance on and radiate from it. You're a bi-talent with a form of sight as your primary, yes?"

Tessa nodded. Liam continued, "And your secondary ability, the perceptual sense, did you experience any restraint issues when it emerged? Any sensory overload? No? That is because you developed conscious control of your cornerstone ability before the secondary one manifested. For reasons we can't explain yet, a paranormal's cornerstone stabilizes his or her other gifts. If your student is as powerful a multi-talent as her case indicates, finding her cornerstone is of paramount importance."  

Tessa sighed, "And I can't do that unless I can talk her into dropping the dome or figure out a way to get under it."

Liam nodded and settled back into his chair. "Tessa, look at me."

 _Oh shit, he suspects something._ She wiped her expression of all outward emotion and lifted it to his searching gaze.

"Do you trust me?"

Tessa jerked in surprise. She had trusted this man from the moment they'd met. She'd never before questioned that faith, never _had_ to question it. Their eyes still locked, she turned her mind inward, to the place where her _feelings_ lived. There was no warning in her, no twinge of doubt. "Yes, sir."

"Liam."

"Yes, Liam. I trust you."

"Does she work in education or healthcare?"

"She did," Tessa rasped then discreetly cleared her throat. "She hasn't worked in years. Retired." _Keep calm, Tessa. Don't panic_.

"How much do you love her?"

She panicked. _Sonofabitch, he's read me. He knows. Fuck, I'll have to warn her, but then she'll run and I'll never see her again. Fuckfuckfuck!_ Only years of practice kept her outward façade of calm from falling apart the way her thoughts did.

Then she noticed the smile on Liam's face. It wasn't the smug grin of a hunter with cornered prey brought to bay. It was sweet, kind and full of warm understanding. "Well," he chuckled. "I guess that answers my question." He leaned forward over his desk and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "And I think I may see a way for you to get under her dome." 

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

10:27pm

 

Dana looked out the wide window of her rented hotel room and into the multicolored night. On the sidewalk below, scattered crowds of humanity came together and drifted apart, their bodies bathed in the flickering rainbow of neon signs that hung from nearly every building on the block. It was Friday night. Dupont Circle was filling. She needed to get going soon or deal with the masses of weekend club goers and tourists that were closing in.

Ducking back behind the thick blackout curtains, Dana turned to check on the woman that had been her evening meal. She was sleeping peacefully with a beatific smile on her face, the nut-brown of her skin still satiny from perspiration. Her chest rose and fell at regular intervals, her pulse strong and steady under the redhead's knowledgeable fingers. The woman was fit and healthy. Barring any unexpected reactions, she would wake in approximately eight to ten hours, parched and famished but unharmed. 

 _I wonder what she'll tell her friends in the morning_? The question floated idly by as she slipped back into her slacks. _Or will she tell anyone?_

Adjusting to this new way of feeding had not been without its downside. Dana was, at heart, a "good Catholic girl." She enjoyed sex but wasn't promiscuous, preferring the intimacy of a relationship over one-night stands. Seducing random people wasn't high on her list of feel good things to do, but indiscriminate hook-ups seemed positively virtuous when the alternative meant stealing from blood banks or turning vigilante—she'd done both and neither rated high on her conscience-meter either.

There was also the not-so-small matter of gender. It didn't take her long to learn that, while she _could_ feed off men, their fluid did not compare. Male ejaculate wasn't as filling. Where an hour or two with a woman could tide her over for several days, she had to go through three or four men to achieve a modicum of satiation. After a quick refresher on the composition of ejaculate, she had to accept that male and female sexual emissions were too disparate to be interchangeable; she would never get the same nutritional value. So, for all intents and purposes, women were her new food source.

At first this had caused Dana some anxiety. Her experiences with women were limited enough that, despite what common sense told her about the laws of attraction, she had harbored some concerns about the efficacy of her social habits and body language on her own sex. That was before she understood that whatever irresistible charm vampires exuded would also apply. Picking up a woman was as simple as walking into a female-centric bar or club and ordering a drink. In the time it took to empty her glass, a small flock of interested candidates would gather around her. No flirtation necessary. It took more effort not to feel like a Judas goat as she made her selection from among the eager 'donors.'

Questionable ethics aside, feeding on sexual secretions was preferable to blood on several levels. She didn't have to worry about sneaking past security guards or fiddling with alarm systems, there was no need to dispose of a body and it was more filling. Ounce for ounce, the amount of lubrication she imbibed left her more sated than the equivalent in plasma. Once things with her and Tessa settled down a bit, she intended to study that in detail.

Thinking of Tessa put a smile on Dana's face. Reconnecting with John and Monica's daughter had made her realize how starved she had been for human contact. Just speaking with another living soul brought a warm glow of contentment back into her life that had long been absent, even if she occasionally wanted to kick said living soul's ass into next week.

Dana chuckled softly as she buttoned her blouse. God, had _she_ ever been so earnest, so single-minded, so intent on saving the world? Had she _ever_ been that young?

Or so in love?

She tried not to think of that aspect of their relationship. Or of how alluring a certain Texas Sheriff had been to her way back when. When that failed, she forcibly shrugged off the comparison. One could argue that her instant attraction to Lucius Hartwell had been generated by the curious lure vampires exploited to attract prey. Was she not using the same enticement to charm women to _her_ bed? There was no reason to believe that Tessa would be immune, but she hoped that, with repeated exposure, a certain amount of resistance would develop. Besides, Dana _knew_ Tessa. Their shared history could only work in her favor.

Tessa's infatuation would eventually fade, Dana was certain of it. For now, she had to give the young woman credit for having the wit to keep her desire from overpowering her good sense. When they were working on Dana's psychic troubles she was all business. When they talked about personal matters she was the epitome of an attentive friend. If, from time to time, she caught Tessa's brown eyes looking at her with a certain wistful longing—well, she wouldn't hold that against her.

She bent down to lace up her boots.

'Admit it, Scully, you like having a partner around who thinks you're hot.'

Fingers paused in mid-bow. Dana still wasn't sure how to take these occasional intrusions of what she classified as Mulder-sense into her mind. Was this a symptom of some underlying psychosis, or was it simply a form of wish fulfillment?

'Maybe you've been alone too long. You haven't developed a taste for flies yet, have you, Renfield?'

She held back a bubble of laughter. "Cute, Mulder."

Dana switched her attention to her other foot. She was weighing the pros and cons of obtaining a wake-up snack for her unconscious dinner companion. Had she seen any snack machines on her way to the room? No, she hadn't.

A healthy eating trend had swept the globe sometime after the alien collective officially made their presence known to humanity. As a result, many hotels and motels opted for imbedded mini-markets now. She applauded the innovation, recalling far too many late nights in the field when dinner had been a bag of potato chips and a diet soda, but she was hesitant to take advantage of it. Security cameras were everywhere, another global trend and one she didn't like in the least. Adept at cosmetic disguises as she was, she still took pains to keep her surveillance footprint to a minimum. Showing her face at the front-desk was a necessity; appearing on the in-store monitoring system was not.

If she was lucky, this hotel would still have the old stand-by coin-ops somewhere. Worst case scenario, she knew the location and floorplan of every drugstore and supermarket in the area. She could get in and out with a minimum of exposure. Next time she would plan ahead.

 _I ought to have considered this before,_ she admonished herself. These people were sustaining her. _The least I can do is leave a few cereal bars and some bottled water on the night stand._

'Practice makes perfect.'

"Shut up, Mulder," she murmured affectionately.

 _< FEAR!!!>_ She was struck by a tidal wave of fright that left her flattened to the floor and gasping for breath. And she knew exactly who it was coming from.

TESSA!

Dana was on her feet, out the door and up the fire escape in an instant, choosing to take to the roofs rather than slalom through traffic.

 _The elders must have tracked her down. They're making their move early. Dammit, I thought I'd have more time to prepare!_ Thank God, she had decided to eat tonight rather than wait until tomorrow. Thank God, the hotel was so near Georgetown.

The terrified redhead charged across the business district within sixty seconds. She was still accelerating when she ran out of buildings to leapfrog. Vaulting the last low parapet, she hit the street and continued her headlong sprint, ducking and weaving around everything that got in her way.

Dana was straining every sense, reaching for Tessa with all she had but there was nothing from the girl except a constant pulse of _scared-scared-scared_. At least she knew Tessa was still alive and wasn't being hurt. Yet. Her vision immediately sharpened, her eyes incandescing as anger burst through the anxiety. If they harmed a single millimeter of her skin—

Tessa's block was coming up fast. Did she use the door, or break in through a window? _Window_ , she decided, t _he better to catch the bastards by surprise with, my dear_.

As she reached the street corner, Dana took an almighty leap, exchanging some of her forward propulsion for upward momentum. Her impact with the wall shuddered through her arms and chest, and she clung to the brickwork beside Tessa's living room window like a pale lizard, holding her breath for any sound of alarm from within. There was nothing. Good.

She was about to punch her fist through the glass when she paused, puzzled. At this range, she should be able to hear more than Tessa's frightened breathing. She should be perceiving her attackers in the room too, scenting them, determining their general position with her other senses, unless—

Unless Tessa _wasn't_ under attack.

The curtains were not quite drawn. Dana peered in. Her eyes widened then narrowed at what she beheld. She let go of the wall, dropping back to the earth like a stone. The tormented soles of her shoes, unable to withstand this final abuse, crumbled on the landing. One of her heels snapped. And so did she.

Icy with barely contained rage, Dana stomped up to the second-floor apartment trailing bits and pieces of distressed black leather from her disintegrating footwear in her wake. The force of her pull as she wrenched open the front door broke both the handle and the deadbolt.

Tessa was half on and half off the couch, head whipped around to face her, mouth agog in shock.

"Teresa Margaret Reyes-Doggett," Dana snarled and stepped across the threshold. The door crashed home behind her of its own accord, eliciting several muffled oaths from the surrounding tenants as the walls reverberated in sympathy. "What the _hell_ do you think you're doing?"

Tessa blinked once then an enormous grin erupted on her face. "Yes!!! Yes, yes, YES!!!"

Dana gaped in disbelief as Tessa began a manic dance around the room, whooping as she thrust her fists into the air victoriously. She felt a moment of disorientation and the apartment disappeared—

She was standing in front of a stalled car on a deserted road as sheets of freezing rain fell from the night sky, pouring over her shivering body and pounding the asphalt where a red spray-painted X marked the spot. It was 1993. She was in Bellefleur, Oregon. Mulder was whooping and cheering, oblivious to the deluge soaking them to the skin. He turned his wild eyes to her and insisted that they had just experienced an episode of missing time.

"Time can't just disappear. It's a universal invariant."

Warm hands gripped her shoulders and the scene vanished. Dana first became aware of odors, whiffs of tea and incense. Sounds came next, terrified screams coming from the entertainment system. Finally, Tessa came into focus, the younger woman peering down at her curiously. "What can't disappear?"

Dana stared up at her blankly. "Huh?"

"Exactly," Tessa replied with a laugh. "You just said something couldn't disappear. What can't?" A beat as the brunette took in the sight of the torn, disheveled remains of her outfit. "Christ, you look like you've been pushed through a paper shredder. You okay?"

 _She doesn't know. She has no idea what she just put me through._ Dana shook her head and wobbled lopsidedly to the couch. "Turn that crap off."

There was a gentle click followed by a soft electric hum as the console powered down. "Dana, what—"

The redhead cut her off. "I just abandoned an unconscious woman in a hotel room across town, Tessa." To her own ears, she sounded utterly exhausted. "I left all of my things, my wallet, my ID, everything in that room, which I haven't yet fully paid for. I ran something like two miles in two minutes with my heart in my throat because _you decided to watch a horror movie_."

Tessa winced and ducked her head. "It was either horror or romance, and I didn't think romance would have the same impact."

Dana's stony expression did not change save for the slight uptick of an eyebrow. The girl reacted as if it were a sharp retort.

"I—I had a t-talk with my mentor about—about your case."

"And?"

"He th-thought you might be an empath. I g-get through your shield because—'cause you—you care about—me." Tessa gulped down a breath and ducked her head closer to her shoulders. "H-h-he suggested I test it. With a strong emotion."

"I see."

"But I thought if you felt anything you'd _call_ me," the girl continued in a rush. "I never would have done this if I'd known you were going to—to." She pointed at her traumatized door, unable to articulate further. "Why didn't you? Call, I mean?"

Dana leaned her head against the sofa's pillowed back and stared sightlessly at the ceiling. "Because when your fear hit me—the force of it was so intense I—I thought the elders—" She was too tired to continue. The last of her anger drained away, taking what remained of her energy with it. _Tessa's smart enough to figure out the rest anyway._ The redhead inhaled deeply and closed her eyes, giving in to lassitude.

Pat-pat-pat went Tessa's slippered feet on the hardwood floor as the woman hastily moved away. Soft sounds drifted to Dana's ears from the direction of the kitchen, the chink-chink of ice dropped into a glass, the crackle of a sealed bottle being opened for the first time. The scent of something distilled tickled her nostrils. Then pat-pat-pat came returning footsteps, bringing with them a strengthening of the spicy, malty aroma of hard liquor. She opened her eyes to the beveled bottom of a tumbler hanging above her forehead.

"Drink this," Tessa said.

Dana took the glass, straightened and sipped. Toasted wood and vanilla tones caressed her tongue then slid down her throat with familiar, lemony-sweet smoothness. She gazed down at the golden amber liquid and nearly asked Tessa when she had decided to try Tullamore D.E.W. but stopped short of the blunder. _Don't be obtuse, she bought this for you. It's probably been sitting untouched on her counter for weeks._ She was shaken out of her reverie by a pile of fabric dropping onto the seat beside her.

"When you're ready, you can put those on." Tessa had already turned away. "I wear a size eight shoe. What are you, a six?"

"Seven-and-a-half," Dana answered, frowning at the retreating figure. Something didn't feel right.

"We're close then." Tessa reappeared with a pair of sneakers in one hand and a pair of socks in the other. Her expression was unexpectedly distant. "These are pretty thick, but you can always double up if they still feel too big." She placed the sneakers on the floor. "I inherited a bunch of mom's old shoes if you ever want to take a look. Maybe you can find something to replace the ones you lost."

Something was bothering Tessa, and it had nothing to do with footwear. Dana reached for the brunette with her free hand.

"Hey, it's okay," she said softy. "I'm not angry anymore. I'm fine."

"I know." Tessa pulled away without meeting her eyes. "Get dressed and I'll drive you back to your hotel."

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

They couldn't leave until Tessa's door was repaired. Dana thought that the handle looked salvageable, but there was no saving the deadbolt. Tessa called the building's superintendent with some fabricated story to explain the damage, but Dana only half-listened to it. She was preoccupied by a growing sense of unease, a feeling of wrongness centered on the girl that she couldn't quite place.

The maintenance-summoned locksmith arrived, a dour fellow with an unsavory disposition. He demanded an offensive amount to replace and install a new lock, a larcenous rate that Tessa accepted without question. That ratchetted up Dana's anxiety another notch; this was not like Tessa at all. She set her apprehension aside long enough to throw the guy out in an exchange of gutter oaths that would have made her brothers proud. She then hijacked Tessa's phone and placed her own call to the super.

The next locksmith was far more reasonable. He showed a sense of humor about the whole situation and replaced both doorknob and deadbolt for a third of the cost. And he was a PN.

"Next time something like this happens, you call me direct," he said with a wink as he handed out his business card. "My sister and me, we get it, and we take care of our own."

Tessa barely reacted to any of this. Dana's agitation multiplied tenfold.

During the silent drive to the hotel, Dana stared out the passenger-side window thinking hard. She was used to Tessa's instant, effusive reactions to situations. This uncharacteristic reserve was baffling. She had no doubt the young woman was upset, but _what_ was she upset about? There were several options to choose from, all of which should have elicited a familiar response, not this subdued quiet.

'Maybe she's jealous.'

Now _that_ was new. Her Mulder-sense usually teased her or made jokes. That sounded like a serious statement.

'I _am_ being serious, Scully. You've never dealt with her from this angle before. Maybe, in this case, subdued _is_ her natural response.'

She considered ignoring this new aspect of her inner Mulder personality then opted not to. She couldn't see what further harm it would cause that she hadn't already done by acknowledging the voice in the first place.

_I don't agree. This isn't how she reacted when we first spoke about my—accidental diet breakthrough. She was hurt when I told her that I didn't remember much of what happened. Visibly hurt. And when I made it clear that I wasn't in love with her, she didn't pretend that she wasn't unhappy. She admitted her feelings, she accepted mine, and she's been nothing but sympathetic since._

There was a pregnant silence behind Dana's eyes that expressed more than any words could.

She bit back a frustrated growl. _Dammit, Mulder, she gave me a list of clubs and their ladies night schedules, and told me to think of it as a beginners dining guide. And she offered to let me use her old home as a place to stay in the city if I ever needed it. The house she grew up in, the house her father and mother both died in. Those are not the actions of someone who's jealous or concealing her emotional state. Tessa uses humor to shield her deeper feelings—like a certain someone I used to know—but she doesn't hide them._

'Well, she may have a reason for wanting to hide them this time. Can't you see that she looks up to you? She doesn't want to disappoint you.

_She could never disappoint me, she knows that._

'And once upon a time she knew you'd always be there, until the day you left. Maybe she's afraid that you'll push her away again, and she's preparing herself for it.'

The comment struck Dana like a punch in the gut. "That was a low blow, Mulder," she rumbled, hurt.

Tessa looked over from the driver's side. "What was that?"

"Nothing," Dana shook her head. "Just talking to myself."

"Oh. Okay." Tessa was turning off of 19th and into the hotel parking lot. "We're here. Where do you want me to park?"

"Under that line of trees on your right." Dana pointed to the deeply shadowed corner for emphasis. The girl quietly complied.

She reached for the door handle and turned to face her silent chauffeur. "Tessa?"

"Yeah?" The brunette was pointedly staring through the windshield at the trees. She did not look in Dana's direction.

The redhead regarded her for a long moment, a multitude of questions in her eyes: _What's the matter, sweetie? Why won't you talk to me? Why are you ostracizing me like this?_ Instead she said, "Stay here, I'll be quick." She didn't wait for a response.

Dana pulled what she thought of as her Spider-man routine to access the fire escape and re-enter the hotel room undetected. Her dinner still slumbered. She had not moved an inch, a blissful unawareness Dana envied.

The ravished woman was given a final examination. Her heart rate was still good, a little slow but strong and within the standard range. Her lungs were clear, her breathing normal. There was no discoloration on her velvety, chocolate skin and her lips had a healthy, pink undertone with no sign of blue or grey. All was well.

Sighing her relief, Dana gathered her things. On the nightstand, she left a paper bag of snacks and two bottles of Elect-2-Oh, an electrolyte infused beverage Tessa bought by the case based on how much of it the girl kept in her refrigerator. She placed her key card next to the bag and took one last look around the room. There was nothing more to be done. She left.

The lone clerk at the front desk glanced up from his smartphone as Dana approached the self-service kiosk. When it was clear that she wouldn't need his services this evening, the young man returned his attention to the glowing screen in his hands, his disinterest evident. One more departing guest was of no importance so long as she took care of her bill.

Out of an abundance of caution, Dana paid for the room through Sunday morning. There was no reaction from the front desk person when she completed her transaction and turned to leave; the guy's nose was practically glued to his phone. The chances of him remembering her were minimal. "So much for customer service excellence," she uttered with a grim smile and walked out.

Back at the car, Tessa was still staring, eyes front, as motionless as the insensate girl she'd just left. Enough was enough. "Will you talk to me, Tessa? Please?"

"About what?" Tessa moved to start the vehicle. Dana caught her hand before she could touch the ignition.

"About what's bothering you," she forced some kindness into what was otherwise a biting reply. "About why you won't look at me all of a sudden. About how you're shutting me—out," her voice failed to sound the last word.

Tessa _was_ shutting her out! Literally. It took that instant of frustration for her to become conscious of what her brain had been trying to tell her for the last couple of hours. All the nervous tension, the sense of something off-kilter, and the certainty that Tessa was at the center of it, all boiled down to one alarming fact: she couldn't sense her anymore.

For the first time in nearly twenty-two years Tessa was not a clear presence in Dana's mind. The realization unnerved her further.

"Tess, you—are you blocking me?"

"Yeah." Tessa's shoulders shook a moment then steadied, "But it's hard to do. I'm not very good at it yet."

"Um, I beg to differ." Dana squeezed Tessa's hand. "You don't register to me at all now and that feels—strange after all this time. Unnatural. I think—it may be driving me a little nuts." She admitted.

'And now you know how _she_ feels.'

"Now you know how _I_ feel." Tessa's cool reply overlapped Mulder's mental remark, making the words echo ominously in Dana's head.

Whatever Tessa saw in Dana's face made her turn abruptly away. "Shit, forget I said that." She slipped her hand from Dana's grasp and punched the start button. The engine rumbled to life.

"You know that you don't have to shield from me, right?" Dana gently chided.

"Oh yes, I do," Tessa answered thickly. Connection or no connection, Dana had no trouble detecting the young woman's swift shift into anger. From the stilted way she backed out of the parking space, to her aggressive oversteer as she re-entered the Saturday night traffic, her every move was a study in suppressed fury.

Dana sighed and tried again. "Tess—"

"Why do you do that?" The girl's tone was strained. "Why do you give me a pass all the time?"

"I don't know what—"

"I interrupted your dinner."  Tessa's jaw was so taut Dana was surprised that she was capable of uttering a single word, much less interjecting a full sentence.

"No, you didn't. I'd already—"

"I scared the shit out of you."

"That's true, but—"

"I made you haul ass across half the city!" Dana was shocked into silence by Tessa's full-throated roar. "You destroyed your clothes! Your shoes! You fucking _love_ your shoes! And you broke cover! You might have been seen! You could have been killed!"

"I _can't_ die," she patently reminded the girl.

"Oh, that's right, you're fucking indestructible. I feel _soooo_ much better."

"Jesus," Dana pinched the bridge of her nose hard enough for her fingertips to turn white. "What do you want from me, Tessa? You made a mistake. I over-reacted to it. But no one got hurt and I'd like to think we've both learned something from this. So, why are you so pissed all of a sudden?"

"Never mind, just forget it," Tessa grumbled as she shoved her foot on the gas and blew through a yellow light.

Dana wisely chose not to press for an answer. Instead she watched in mystified silence as Tessa channeled her irritation into driving with all the speed and skill of an Indy 500 qualifier. By the time she was done racing back through the DC streets, Tessa looked thoroughly worn-out. She pulled to a shaky stop in the tenant lot.

"I'm going to bed, Dana," Tessa wearily intoned and climbed out of the car.

"Alright."

"I can't drive you home. Please don't ask me to."

"You don't need to." Dana wasn't ready to tell her that she was incapable of going home; that uncomfortably dead spot in her mind would not let her leave. "I'll stay here tonight, if that's okay with you."

"Sure."

"I'll take the couch."

Tessa nodded listlessly, "Okay."

Apathetic. Withdrawn. Detached. They were back at square one. Dammit.

'Nothing like being shut out to make you appreciate how terrible being shut out feels.'

_Back off, Mulder._

'Not until you stop giving that kid your cold shoulder.'

Dana mulled that over as they climbed back up the stairs and into Tessa's apartment. For as long as she could remember, she'd used an icy demeanor as self-protection. Growing up a Navy brat, traveling from port to port, never settling down long enough to make friends, or worse, being torn from someone you were stupid enough to bond with once your dad's current tour was over, made for a lot of loneliness. The cure to that loneliness had been self-reliance and an aloof manner that didn't let anyone in. As she grew older, her life choices only served to make her seem colder and more distant.

Dana and her few female peers in medical school had been accused of being ice queens more than once. At the FBI, she was 'the iron lady' until her involvement with Mulder had labeled her 'Mrs. Spooky' permanently. A few months after joining the surgical team at Our Lady of Sorrows Hospital, she'd overheard one head nurse call her 'Red Thatcher' (she'd slapped _that_ jackass with a sexual harassment complaint).

As a woman in a series of male-dominated professions, indifference was Dana's best defense.

'But you're not dealing with the boy's club anymore, Scully. Do you really need to defend yourself against Tessa?'

_It's not that simple._

'It never is with you.'

_What are you trying to say?_

'That you won't let your guard down with _anyone_ anymore, not even yourself. Especially not yourself, or you might have realized by now that she means more to you than just a stand-in for the child you never got to raise.'

Dana's jaw dropped _. You sanctimonious prick!_ she thought back, incensed. _How dare you?_

'How dare I what? Hold you accountable for having feelings? Or force you to see them?'

_That is enough. This conversation is over._

Dana waited for a few tense seconds. When there were no further volleys, she heaved a sigh of relief, glad to know that her subconscious still knew when to quit. There was something distinctly alarming about the tenor of this argument. For a second or two it felt as if Mulder really had been in the room. That was impossible, of course. Her mind simply conjured his phantom a little too realistically this time. If it got any worse, she would have to find a way to exorcise his ghost. She would not risk a serious break in reality. Not now. Not with Tessa so close to her.

She fell backward onto the couch and a small avalanche of bedclothes fell onto her lap, startling her. So engrossed was Dana in her mental argument, she'd taken no notice of the blankets and pillows Tessa had left, or of the woman's final retreat from the living room.

Now Dana was torn between letting Tessa sleep and trying one last time to get to the root of what was troubling the girl. Her head told her it would be best if she let it go until morning, but her heart argued otherwise. Mulder's innuendoes still rang like inconvenient truths, demanding that she prove them wrong. The denunciations were nothing more than the ravings of her guilty conscience, and yet Tessa _was_ deliberately closing herself off from her. Why? There could be a dozen good reasons but she was no longer sure Tessa was being entirely rational.

Did Tessa believe that she would just up and leave? That she could be so ruthless as to use her as the means to an end then go back into hiding? That was what the Mulder-sense had suggested and, God how it upset her, but the more Dana considered the offensive idea, the more she thought that he might be right.

She had forced their separation once before, in Tessa's youth, and she hadn't exactly been demonstrative towards the young woman since they'd reunited. Using that line of reasoning, it seemed more and more likely that Tessa's calculated shut down was a reaction to fear that she'd soon be abandoned. Again.

"And everything I've said, everything I've done since her mother's funeral has been compounding that fear," she whispered the harsh words in a rush of self-condemnation. "I _have_ been giving her the cold shoulder. Shit." 

The redhead stood and slipped out of her borrowed sneakers. She padded to Tessa's bedroom on still socked feet to find the door was closed, the wafer of wood sending a clear message: keep out. A quick test of the knob, however, showed her it was not locked. That was another message: you can come in, if you really want to. That decided her. She let herself inside.

Tessa was a shapeless mass on the bed. Dana spoke quietly in the direction of the humped form, "Did you know that your mom asked me to help take care of you?"

There was a slight shift under the heavy comforter. Tessa was awake and she was listening.

"She drove out to Virginia to see me. It was the only time she ever paid a visit after—after I went silent. She and your father were having trouble finding after-school care for you and JJ. You were so precocious, always chasing after your brother and getting into trouble." She smiled a little at the memory and let it creep into her tone. "The two of you were driving everybody crazy. And you pointing out things no one else could see didn't help."

Was that a breath or a chuckle from the hump? She hoped it was the latter.

"Your parents were scared, Tessa," Dana continued, settling carefully on the bed's farthest edge. "They could only waive it away as a five-year-old's overactive imagination for so long. They were afraid of what might happen if the wrong ears got wind of it."

Monica had been especially frightened as Dana silently recalled, frightened enough to scream curses at her when she didn't answer her repeated pleas to let her in. But there had been no need to expose the other woman further to her shaky control. Dana's link to Tessa had already given her a good idea of the subject matter, and what she gathered from Monica's anxiety-laden thoughts—received miles before her car had reached the turnoff—told her the rest. She slipped a three word note to her friend and ex-partner under the door: Don't tell John.

What _had_ Monica told John? Now that her old friend was gone only God knew. Whatever it was, she'd successfully kept the secret from him; a mistake Dana still regretted. If she hadn't kept her involvement or her continued existence from Doggett, things might have played out differently. Coulda, shoulda, woulda.

Such remorse was best left for another day, not for the here and now. _Focus, Dana, focus._

"They had plenty of reasons to be afraid. I knew it, and it wasn't as if I had a full social schedule." She gave an unseen shrug in the darkness. "So, I agreed to secretly babysit. And how could I refuse? I had enhanced strength, superhuman speed, extrasensory perception, everything any childcare professional could wish for. And my God, Tessa, when I think back on some of the situations I had to wrestle you out of—" Dana's soft laugh found a bedspread-muffled echo. "—well, I learned the hard way to appreciate my indestructibility."

She let their shared memories play out into lingering silence while she slid closer to the mound of bed sheets. "I loved every minute of it, you know. I felt—better around you. Alive. Human. You lit up my world like no one else. I loved you." With exquisite care, she laid her hand on the part of the mass where she thought Tessa's shoulder must be. "I still do."

The blanketed hump stiffened beneath her touch and Dana held her breath. There was a shifting movement under her palm, then a tug and another shift. Tessa was shrugging her off. She closed her eyes and let her hand slide slowly away while wordlessly demanding that her heart stop constricting so painfully beneath her rib cage. Then, with a scrabbling sound of nails on fabric, she felt Tessa's fingers reaching for and finding hers, pinning them in place. The knot in her chest loosened considerably. She remembered to breathe.

"I—I never wanted to leave you back then. And I don't want to leave you now. Even if, by some miracle, you were able to correct all my psychic issues in the blink of an eye, I wouldn't want to go."

"But you'll have to—right?" How much did those five words cost Tessa to say out loud?

Dana badly wanted to take the implied out, just say 'yes' because, eventually, she would have to choose between her happiness and Tessa's life, but the necessary words caught in her throat before she could utter them.

Her goddamned heart was twisting again, the muscle moving in ways it had no right to move. The thing wrung itself repeatedly against her arteries, beating at the layers of surrounding tissue with its own private form of Morse code: how much will _you_ pay? How much will _you_ pay?

 _Anything!_ she answered the tortured piece of meat, surprised by her own vehemence. _I'll pay anything to keep her._

She inhaled through her nose then exhaled slowly from her mouth, letting her diaphragm relax before replying, "I don't know." She repeated the process, inhale, exhale, and relax. "Maybe not for a while—a long while, I hope."

"It hurts."

Dana's eyebrows shot up, "What hurts, sweetie?"

"My head." Tessa's voice sounded so small. "Shielding from you hurts."

"Then stop, don't do it anymore."

"I have to." Such a stubborn streak, bent on martyrdom. Just like John.

'And just like a certain someone _I_ used to know.'

_Shut up, Mulder._

There was little point in getting into a long-winded argument. Dana didn't want to waste the time or the energy it would take to get Tessa to stop digging in her heels and see reason. What she needed was a diversion, something to distract her until common sense reasserted itself. She thought fast, pulling up possible scenarios and tossing them aside just as quickly.

When the answer came, it was so obvious that she nearly clapped her hand to her forehead. Why had she not thought of it before? All it would take was one small tweak on her part.

One little adjustment.

One big change.

But was it possible?

Would it hurt to try?

It might, but what the hell. If it got rid of that awful numb area buried in her cerebellum, it would be worth it. 

Dana lifted her legs up, scooted over and laid down right behind the lump. A picture formed in her mind; Tessa smiling, joy touching the golden depths of her deep, brown eyes. Such an amazing, beautiful mind behind that familiar visage, she thought. She then brought forth an image of her protective dome, solid and impregnable. It was such a simple thing to visualize taking Tessa's hand and leading her under that shelter, of them standing together under it, defending them both.

Tessa's response was immediate and galvanic, her body thrashing and jackknifing violently as she teared at her self-made cocoon.

Dana panicked then, certain that she'd made a critical error and, as a result, the girl was having some sort of seizure.

OhgodohgodwhathaveIdone?!? She was fighting for calm, struggling for control as she tried to hold Tessa still, her hands vying for purchase on the slippery sheets. Gottapullitoffgottapullitoffgotta—

"Don't!"

—keepherfromswallowinghertongueandgethertoahospitalbefore—

"Dana!!!"

Tessa had flipped her ponderous bulk over and was staring wide-eyed into her face. She was smiling. No, she was grinning. From ear to ear. The dead spot was gone, replaced by a blazing coal of _amazed-happy-incredulous-happy-wonder-happy-happy-happy-happy_. She was back. Her baby girl was back!

With a delighted laugh, Dana pulled Tessa into a tight embrace. It was reciprocated with feeling. The woman was shaking in her arms, or maybe she was. Could be they both were. No matter, a little trembling was understandable under the circumstances.

"You're real," Tessa murmured into the crook of Dana's neck. "You're real. You're real. You're real." She sounded like a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown, or in the throes of religious ecstasy.

And _happy-happy-happy_ continued to thrum like a pulse in her brain, a jubilant, steady counterpoint beating inside her skull. To think she'd often wished that hum gone from her life, once desired its silence with her whole heart. God, what a fool she'd been not to see it for the blessing that it was.

"Shhh, Tessa, shhh. Everything's alright now," Dana crooned in return as she lovingly stroked the brunette's hair again and again.

"—real. You're real." With each word, Tessa's lips brushed over her skin, sending pleasant shivers around her throat and down her spine. Very pleasant shivers of an unexpectedly erotic nature.

To Dana's dismay, a bud of warmth took root in her lower abdomen.

She should have seen this coming. After all of the emotional turmoil she'd experienced tonight, her body was bound to react. She told herself that this arousal was nothing but a physiological post-threat response, normal, reasonable and fully explainable by medical science.

'Has anyone ever told you that you take the fun out of life, Scully?'

Dana ignored her old partner's voice and concentrated instead on the girl in her arms. The stream of _happy-wonder-rapture_ feelings coming from Tessa were drifting off into a sort of indistinct drowsy contentment. She was falling asleep. Despite their close contact, she'd detected no hint of sensuality from her, for which Dana was heartily relieved. If there had been, she might have been hard pressed not to respond.

As the bud began to grow in her belly, she couldn't help but wonder what consequences there might be for opening her mind to Tessa in such an intimate way. It didn't seem outside the realm of possibility that she might one day find herself reacting to, or perhaps absorbing some of her longing.

'Now you're just being ridiculous. Why can't you recognize that she's not your charge anymore and she never was your child? Why is your attraction to her so hard to accept?'

She ignored that criticism too. It was more difficult to disregard the blossom of need that had flowered deep inside her or the offshoot vines of want threading their way through her torso.

Tessa was slumbering peacefully, supremely unaware of Dana's increasing discomfort. There was one obvious solution to this problem. She could disentangle herself from the girl, leave her to her dreams and go back to the living room with its safe, platonic couch.

The cold and lonely couch.

She couldn't bear the thought of such solitary confinement when she could choose to stay here wrapped in Tessa's comforting warmth. She would just have to clamp her thighs together and deal with the heat and the ache. She'd endured worse for less.

'Scully?'

Don't acknowledge it.

'I'm only trying to help you. You know that.'

Right. Some help, figment.

'Look, if I took it too far, I apologize. Don't do this.'

She would not back down.

'I'm sorry, Scully. Please—please talk to me?'

The remorse seemed so genuine, so authentically Mulder. The man seldom apologized for anything. The few times when he did, his show of contrition invariably undid her, his honest repentance cooling her ire, as it did now.

_Alright, Mulder, but understand this; it's too soon for me to think of her that way, okay? Even imagining the possibility feels—incestuous. I do not want to discuss it further with you or anyone else. Have I made myself clear?_

'Crystal.'

_Good._

'Scully?'

_Yeah?_

'Thank you.'

Dana smiled. _Don't. I'm being entirely mercenary here. I'd miss your self-righteous ass a lot more if I cut you off._

Deep in the little corner of her mind where it resided, she could feel the Mulder-sense chuckle. Dana relaxed and let her eyes drift shut.

"Scully?'

_Hmmm?_

'Once you change your mind—can I watch?'

Her shoulders shook with a burst of barely contained laughter. _You are an incorrigible bastard!_

'And deviant. You forgot deviant.'

Dana's shoulders shook harder. Tessa, disturbed by the movement, muttered something incoherent and shifted away. Dana coaxed her back into the circle of her arms with soft noises of affection. At the resumption of the gentle stroking of her hair, Tessa relaxed again, her soft cheek coming to rest upon the ex-agent's chest. Dana breathed in her scent and cuddled closer to her slumbering form.

The new silence that filled Dana's mind was both highly amused and very smug.

_Shut up, Mulder._

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Head Over Heels" – The Go-Go's

                                             "Self-Control" – Laura Branigan

                                             "Iris" – Goo Goo Dolls

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, my fellow readers, how I've missed you! I would have updated sooner if it had been at all possible. The sad thing is that this chapter had already been 3/4ths written by Christmas. But the first 2-3 months of the year is when my office is the busiest, and I've been working 12-14 hour days and 6-day work weeks since January 1st. Add to that the medical care-giving (family health trouble) and I found myself unable to write again until the last week of February. If I wasn't sure how important writing was to me before, I know it now because I've never been so miserable. *laughs* 
> 
> Anyway, I do hope you'll stick with me. I may not update as quickly as anyone (myself included) would like, but I will eventually.
> 
> A big thank you to my roommate for giving me my writing time, and reminding to go to bed every work-night.
> 
> And a bigger thank you to all who have left kudos and/or comments. I do love to hear your thoughts, so feel free to drop a line. :)


	12. Chapter 10-Oracle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of timely information is received from an unexpected source and place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Your eyes are not deceiving you; I HAVE posted a new chapter! Enjoy! :)

Centers for Paranormal & Extraterrestrial Research

Washington, DC

September 5, 2042 -- 3:10pm

 

Tessa was sitting at a corner table in CPER's deserted cafeteria single-mindedly devouring a BLT when she picked up a grouping of familiar pings moving toward her.

"Hey, Tessa?"

At the sound of the hesitant, almost apologetically spoken words, Tessa chewed her mouthful as quickly as she could, swallowed it down, and then looked up into the round, chubby face hovering over her.

Madeline Cross was a precognition-channel combo in her mid-thirties, overweight and painfully shy. She lived mainly in her head, preferring the safe confines of her self-created fantasy world to the ugly realities that she viewed with her wonderfully expressive hazel eyes. Getting her to converse on any subject was often a struggle but Tessa always made the effort. She liked the reclusive woman intensely.

"Hi, Madeline, is everything okay?"

"I think we should be asking you that," she replied, ducking her head bashfully. For Madeline, it was impossible to think of herself as an individual when she was perpetually accompanied by no less than three other spirit presences. Some people had trouble understanding this need to refer to her person in plurals but Tessa, with her built-in entity radar, wasn't one of them.

Madeline's hand crept up to the pony tail she kept her light brown hair in and absentmindedly smoothed a fly-away curl behind one ear.  "I imagine Project VAMP is still keeping you busy."

Tessa just quirked a wordless smile in the other woman's direction and took another bite of her sandwich.

The folks in research and development were acronym-happy They heard through CPER's gossip net about her current brainchild, the digitizing of the vampire files into a functional database, and had been brainstorming possible names for it ever since. She thought the moniker R&D had their hearts set on—VAMP for Vampiric Algorithm Memory Processor—was more than a little cliché and hardly accurate, but she hadn't been asked for her opinion. Personally, she didn't care what anyone called it so long as she obtained the approval to create it.

From the moment Tessa had cautiously suggested updating the old system to Liam she had been planning feverishly for her first review board meeting with her mentor, laying out the design specs, coming up with a reasonable timeline for the build and writing her presentation for the Final Five. As a result, she'd been keeping some pretty solitary hours and mealtimes.

"Yes, of course it is," Madeline answered for her, eyes downcast as she backed away. "Sorry we interrupted your lunch." Tessa had to reach out and tug on the hem of the stout woman's blouse to keep her from making good on her escape.

"You're never an interruption, Madeline," she said in her friendliest voice. "I'm glad to see you. How've you been?"

At Tessa's gentle encouragement, Madeline joined her at the table, her smile warming the room emotionally by ten degrees. "I'm good, I'm good," she said, for once referring to her own presence sans her ethereal entourage. "I just started to worry because you hadn't been around much." Her expression turned distressed, "Then we heard about the pool."

Ah, the pool. What else could bring Madeline out of voluntary isolation to seek her out? Frankly, Tessa was surprised that the betting hadn't started sooner. Being assigned to the vampire files was considered a death sentence; gambling over the how and the when of her inevitable demise was to be expected.

"Hey, it's okay." Tessa began to stroke Madeline's hand the way one stroked a cat's back to keep it happy and settled, and for the same reason. "I don't mind, and neither should you."

"It's cruel."

"I know," Tessa sighed. It _was_ cruel and a little sick. PNs were a marginalized group; they should know better than to indulge in such callous practices. However, PNs were also human; that they were as fully capable of insensitive or prejudicial behavior as anyone else was an unfortunate fact of life.

"And they're wrong! They're all wrong, Tessa!"

"Well, _that's_ good to know!" she laughed. "Is CPER's best precog telling me I'm gonna be okay?"

Tessa expected Madeline to drink up the compliment and light up the room with another smile, or better yet, her sweet laughter, but when she shrank away instead, the bewildering reaction shocked the researcher into taking a hard look at her colleague. What she saw made her forget the remains of her lunch on the fiberboard table.

Madeline's face was devoid of expression, her gaze fixed to the industrial grey wall behind Tessa, pupils dilated to such an extreme there was no color left in them. These were all classic indicators of a precognitive trance.

"They don't like you," Madeline whispered as the endless, black oubliettes of her eyes stared into a place only she could see.

The base of Tessa's skull prickled and the hairs on the back of her neck rose. "Who?"

"The ones that watch. They watch her. They're afraid of her."

No question in Tessa's mind what this was about. _It's nothing we didn't already know,_ she thought calmly. _Dana told me they were afraid and she knew she'd be surveilled. We've been taking precautions_. She kept silent, waiting, hoping for more. She would soon regret her wish.

"They should be scared. They'll push her past the point of no return and when it happens none of them will survive her retribution." Her blank stare turned into a look of almost comical dismay. "Oh, God—all the blood," she whimpered.

Tessa swallowed hard and rubbed the woman's big hand in an attempt to comfort her. "Don't look at the blood. Look at something else."

Madeline nodded and her eyes shifted sluggishly in their sockets. "They aren't sure about you. You're an unknown factor. An X-File." Her hand began to tremble beneath Tessa's chafing fingers. "They're split now. Factions for and against. Plans within plans. It's dark. Too many variables. Too far to see."

With a sudden jerk of her head, Madeline arrowed in on Tessa's face, her pupils shrinking to pinpricks with dizzying speed. "The monsters will protect you until they're ready to make friends," she intoned gravely.

That was the breaking point. The vision released its hold and Madeline's whole body shuddered. "Whoa," she said, blinking her eyes repeatedly to moisturize them.

"Whoa is right," Tessa replied and pushed her half-empty bottle of Elect-2-Oh before the shaken woman. It was taken gratefully and chugged dry.

"We hate the apple flavor," Madeline said with a mew of distaste.

"Sorry."

Madeline shuddered again and put her hands to her eyes. "Who on Earth have you gotten involved with, Tessa?"

"You didn't—see her?"

"We didn't see anyone," was Madeline's shaky response. "All we saw were silhouettes, shadow figures. Except for you." She began massaging her eye sockets, her palms rotating over them in opposite directions as she spoke. "And she was behind you, hovering, but not threatening. Protective. She kept changing too, shape-shifting, but always a strong image.

"First she was like a knight, on horseback with a sword in her hand. Or maybe she was more like an amazon, no armor. Then she was huge, like a giant, or maybe one of the Titans from Greek mythology. They were giants and they were elemental forces too. She felt like that, like an elemental force." Madeline pressed her fingertips against her closed eyelids." There was more, other shapes she morphed into, but we can't remember. We're starting to forget."

"You've remembered plenty," Tessa replied in as steady a voice as she could muster. "You don't need to tell me anymore."

"But we do," the heavy woman insisted. "The last thing was the most important. You need to know about the wings. She grew massive wings, like an angel is supposed to have. And glowing eyes. Glowing, blue neon eyes. She wrapped those wings around you and the other shadows backed away. All except one, a man, we think. He felt masculine, anyway. And then _he_ grew wings too, or maybe he already had them and was just spreading them. He stood behind you and her, and he was so tall, and his wings were enormous! Then the light came and we didn't see anything else."

Like a small, woodland creature emerging from its burrow, Madeline crept from behind her hands to ogle Tessa with wonder. "Who _is_ she?"    

For a moment, Tessa considered telling Madeline everything. Of all the PNs she knew, she believed the precog-channel was the only one who would listen without judgement or panic. In an instant she had the words lined up in her head:

_You saw my old imaginary ghost-friend Dana Scully, except I've known for a while now that she never was imaginary or a ghost either. But I'm not involved with her, at least not the way that I want to be. You see, Madeline, she's incredible; the most brilliant, amazing person I've ever met, and I'm falling more in love with her every day, but she doesn't see me. She can't see past the little girl I was, the kid her partners had. And here's the worst part, I know that she's incapable of interest—in fact, she's told me so—but I keep slipping deeper and deeper anyway. Isn't that pathetic? Oh, and while we're sharing, you should also know that she's immortal and a vampire, and those watchers are a bunch of really old vampires who want her dead, except that she can't die. I did tell you she's immortal, right? Well, they're pretty pissed about that. And one last thing before I swear you to secrecy, when her eyes glow they're not blue, they're blue-green and neon wishes it could be that beautiful._

Yes, Madeline would listen. She would commiserate. She would keep her secret. She would not judge her or panic—but she would worry. She would worry _a lot_. And because she hardly ever spoke to anyone, she would carry that burden of concern in solitude. No one would be there to console Madeline except the spirits who kept her company. Cold comfort, some would say.

Was she willing to put a friend through all that just so she could get a little sympathy? Absolutely not. As much as she wanted the understanding ear, her fellow PN had enough to deal with.

"Well, she's no angel," Tessa said with a sad smile. "No Titan either, but she does save people. She's a doctor."

"Saving lives," Madeline nodded slowly, methodically. "Life must be the elemental force we felt. But those watching shadows—"

Tessa thought quickly. "Those were probably—associates," she managed without too long a pause. Deflecting her colleague's thoughts to more mundane possibilities was a difficult thing to do without resorting to outright lies.

Madeline's wide brow furrowed in thought, "They did feel angry—or maybe they were jealous?"

"Something like that," Tessa nodded and told her guilty conscience to take a hike. "It wouldn't surprise me. I've been taking up a lot of her free time."

Again, Madeline nodded in her measured, thoughtful way. She opened her mouth to say something more but her stomach interrupted with an audible rumble.

Tessa grinned, "Someone's experiencing post-trance hunger."

"We can't help it," Madeline whispered as her cheeks reddened.

"I know you can't." She stood and bowed to the embarrassed woman with a wild flourish of her arms, "Milady, would you honor this unworthy knave by accompanying her to the local eatery?"

Madeline giggled and shook her head, "But the cafeteria's still serving."

"Pah!" Tessa turned her face in mock disgust and was rewarded with another giggle. "Such charm and grace deserves better than peasant slop!" Tessa threw herself to one knee and pressed her hands dramatically to her chest. "Please milady. But say the word and I will whisk you away to—Moon Over Bangkok."

"We love sushi!"

"Then let us fly to that which you love!" Tessa sprang to her feet and extended a hand. Madeline took it beaming.

"Charlie's getting jealous, Tessa."

"Charlie should know that I don't stand a chance," she quipped with a wink.

"He does," Madeline's smile faltered. "But you can touch."

"Oh honey, I'm sorry." Tessa loosened her grip immediately but the other woman did not let go of her hand. "How close is he? Any word?"

"Closer. Soon." Madeline's wide shoulders rose and fell with the depth of her sigh. "But not soon enough for him. He misses us."

"I can't blame him."

"You're such a flirt," Madeline accused, but her smile had returned.

Tessa tipped an invisible hat with her free hand, "I just call 'em as I see 'em, ma'am."

At Tessa's light tug, Madeline rose to her feet. "Will you see her today?" the precog-channel asked.

"I hope so."

"Bring her some sushi. Combo B. Extra ginger dressing."

Tessa studied Madeline's eyes for a long moment; her pupils were normal. "Where did _that_ come from?"

"Where do your _feelings_ come from?" Madeline's level gaze told her not to ask such stupid questions.

"Touché."

The two of them, hands still linked, made their way to the open cafeteria doors.

"Charlie can't wait to physically meet you."

Tessa ducked her head, "Not to punch me, right?"

"No," Madeline snickered and the woman's large hand squeeze Tessa's in reassurance astonishing the researcher completely. "He likes you. Very much."

"I—I'm glad," she stammered, still startled by this unexpected show of support.

"And Tessa?"  Madeline gave her a warm smile full of compassion. "He wants us to tell you not to lose hope. Okay?"

Tessa smiled back, "Okay."

"Combo B, don't forget."

"With extra ginger dressing," she recited.

Together they walked out into the empty hall.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "How Far We've Come" – Matchbox Twenty

                                             "I'm Alright" (Theme from Caddyshack) – Kenny Loggins

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We have reached the end of another chapter, fellow readers, and I thank you for continuing along this rather winding road with me. Every chapter is a labor of love, even the Scully-less ones, but never fear, Our Lady of Perpetual Skepticism will grace us with her presence shortly.
> 
> For the record, I was a little concerned about posting this. It was originally the first section of another three-parter but after several re-reads, I felt that it worked better on its own. However, I'm worried that I might be boring you. After all, this is supposed to be a romance (IT IS, I SWEAR IT!), but it was never meant to be *just* a romance...
> 
> ...So, am I boring you? Or are you appreciating the other aspects of this tale too? Please let me know in the comments section if you have some time.
> 
> Big hugs to all who have left kudos and comments and, again, thank you so much for reading. :)


	13. Chapter 11-Mad World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tessa is put through her paces (in several ways) and Dana proves that even an 78-year-old doctor can experience growing pains (of a sort).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Friends and neighbors, I'm thrilled to present this, my latest chapter! Please enjoy, I certainly did. :)  
> Edit note: I initially screwed up Scully's age in the chapter summary and had to correct. D'oh! *facepalm*

Interstate 395

Washington, DC

September 5, 2042 -- 6:32pm

 

Tessa was nearing her mother's house—it was still difficult for the young woman to think of it as belonging solely to her—prudently maneuvering through rush hour's scattered remains as the aromatic scents of sushi rice, soy sauce and ginger wafted over her. Every inhalation was a pleasant reminder of the deliciousness contained within the Moon Over Bangkok take-out bag resting on the passenger seat of her car. With Madeline's prophesy weighing so heavily on her mind any diversion was a welcome one.

The PN fought valiantly against a melancholy that wanted to engulf her. There was no reason for pessimism, not when the overall message seemed to suggest that she and Dana would ultimately prevail. As for some of the darker aspects of Madeline's vision, the old chestnut 'forewarned is forearmed' rang true. Precognition was a highly valued global commodity because the future was not set in stone. Anything foreseen could be changed for the better.

"Or for the worse," she muttered gloomily. To smother that unhappy thought, she breathed deeply of the fragrant meal beside her.

Madeline had given Tessa a gift of immense value, a gift that had to be handled with care. Predictions were like crystal sculptures, beautiful and fragile. One wrong move and the whole thing could shatter into splinters of glass, shards that would cut to the bone when you tried to pick up the pieces.

A mellow bell tone caressed her other sense as she pulled into her childhood driveway—Dana's ping—and her sorrowful mood lightened considerably. How could she possibly be unhappy with that healthy, luminous resonance in her mind? If she ever needed a reason not to lose hope, there was no better motivation than the extraordinary changes she beheld in her friend.

Liam, her mentor, had been right, determining Dana's cornerstone was the crucial breakthrough. Bringing her empathic primary under control had led to the unearthing of a veritable laundry list of satellite talents, a list that grew every time they worked together.

To date Tessa had established that Dana could both transmit and receive telepathically over an astounding range, could move multiple objects at once telekinetically, and had an intuitive sense so powerful that it bordered on the precognitive. Then there was her endless psychic energy. A PN could use his or her abilities for as long as his or her endurance allowed before hitting 'bottom,' the point where energy reserves failed and the body collapsed, physically spent. Dana had yet to exhibit any such limit; she seemed bottomless.

Yet regardless of all the astonishing potential Dana presented, what mattered most to Tessa was the fundamental alteration in the ex-agent's character. The moody, withdrawn, suicidal recluse that she had found in a crumbling Virginia farmhouse no longer existed. The woman who had emerged from this self-imposed exile was compassionate, engaging and possessed of a razor-sharp wit and not-quite-dry delivery that Tessa found irresistible. Pitting her more jocular humor against Dana's they would exchange gentle barbs and one-liners until one or the other could no longer keep from laughing.

Getting Dana to let go and laugh took a whole lot of effort but those infrequent moments were what Tessa lived for lately. When Dana was caught in the throes of unguarded hilarity, she was magnificent to behold, a being gloriously alive and glad of it. At the closing of such days, Tessa would fall into bed with a smile on her face and a sob held stubbornly in her throat, praying that Dana's improved shielding—the dome now mercifully obsolete—kept her from sensing her almost constant aching desire.

Her life had become an insane mix of fun and torment, a sitcom's take on medieval torture; and here she was, eagerly anticipating her role in another episode of _Monty Python Meets the REAL Councilors of the Spanish Inquisition_ , or maybe _I Love Torquemada_ would be a better title. And that gave her an idea—

Grinning widely, Tessa thought, _Oh Lucy, I'm hooome!_ to her waiting friend, flavoring the words with Desi Arnaz' iconic Ricky Ricardo accent. She had to smother a giggle as she felt Dana's start of disbelief.

'You have no right to be familiar with that show,' was Dana's acerbically amused mental reply. 'Television ceased broadcasting in two dimensions when you were five and even those 2D hold outs had stopped playing the black and white stuff years before.'

_Blame Dad_ , she thought back as she unloaded their meal from the car. _He was an old-school movie buff and loved Lucille Ball. No 3D-enhanced, colorized classics in his Blu-ray collection._

'Between him and your New Age mother, I'm surprised you can relate to your generation at all.'

_I prefer your generation anyway_. The innuendo-laced sending was out of Tessa's head before good sense could rein it in. Dammit. Open mind, insert foot. She gingerly stepped into the house, uncomfortably aware of the sudden mental silence.

Taking pains to keep her next thought clear of anything remotely carnal, Tessa sent a subdued _I brought something special for dinner_ into the chill atmosphere.

Dana's reprisal was swift.

The living room sofa slid quietly across the darkened foyer, blocking the corridor. Tessa, unable to register the movement in the dim interior, walked right into the couch's high back, ramming her abdomen hard enough to leave her gasping. She managed to save herself from flipping head-over-heels but the meal she was cradling tumbled from her flailing arms. The take-out bag bounced once, did a barrel roll over the seat cushions and landed on the white oak floor below with a hard whump.

Heart beating hard at the near fall, Tessa took a fast look around. All the furniture had been moved; the room was a maze.

"Oh, come on, I just got here!"

'You have three seconds,' came Dana's implacable sending.

"Three?!" Tessa sputtered. _But you've always given me five!_ she frantically thought back as she dove into a sprint.

Dana's response was to shift the dining room table into her path. Tessa yelped and dropped, sliding inelegantly beneath it on one pant-clad hip. _Thank you, mom, for talking dad out of wall-to-wall carpeting._

Dana called it escape training. In theory, the object of the game was simple: Tessa had five minutes to reach a pre-determined safe-zone while dodging any obstacles in her way. In practice, it took everything she had and then some not to end up in traction. The ex-agent pulled no punches and was ruthlessly inventive in her efforts to take her down.

Clambering back to her feet, Tessa resumed her plunge through a house turned malevolently sentient. Chairs and end tables careened all around her, controlled by Dana's telekinetic ability. There was no sound at all save her own ragged breathing and sharp foot falls as she dodged, weaved and ducked through the shifting gauntlet of home furnishings. She felt like a bug scrambling through a silent, lightless pinball game.

Tessa's other sense picked up the tell-tale ping ahead and to her left, in the laundry room. That split-second of warning was the PN's best advantage. Her second-best advantage was what she pulled from the pocket of her trousers; a handful of sesame seeds.

Vampires had one universal weakness: they were compulsive counters and puzzle solvers. Hand a vampire a knot, and the creature had to untie it. Toss some grains before one and he or she would be incapable of doing anything until every pip had been gathered and totaled. Dana had exhaustively hammered this rule into Tessa, insisting that she carry knotted strings in her bag and packets of rice in her pockets. After some experimenting at home, Tessa thought that sesame, being so small and light weight, might take longer to collect, granting her yet another edge. This would be a crucial test of that theory.

When a dark, menacing shape hurtled at her from the shadows, Tessa was ready. She threw the seeds to the floor, forcing Dana to skid to a halt and allowing her to streak around the crouching redhead. The way was clear. She pounded the final few feet to the sunporch and slapped the glass door hard enough for the panes to shudder in their frames.

"Safe!" Tessa shouted then leaned forward, hands on knees, panting with exertion.

"You should have yelled fire," Dana's voice was gently admonishing. She was right beside her, leaning casually against one of the porch's tall windows, arms crossed over her chest, the hint of a satisfied smile touching her mouth. She wasn't even winded.

_Show off_.

Tessa shot her friend a hostile glare. "The last thing I need—is a bunch of my neighbors—bursting in here with buckets—and fire extinguishers," she replied between breaths.

Dana's Mona Lisa smile deepened. "Good point," she conceded. She gave Tessa's back an encouraging pat. "Come on, walk it off."

Tessa obediently began circling the sun dappled room, cooling down as she watched the furniture glide back to their original positions. "Your control has improved," she said with grudging admiration. "You've been practicing."

"And you've been strategizing. Those sesame seeds were an inspired touch. Tiny little bastards. They were a bitch to see and a pain to pick up."

The approval in Dana's tone filled Tessa with pleasure despite her quivering muscles and throbbing hip—she was surely developing one hell of a bruise. "If you think picking them up's a bitch, try plucking them off wet clothes fresh out of the washer."

Dana grimaced in sympathy, "But they're sure to slow down any vampires coming at you. That's worth the aggravation."

"If they're as fast as you are, I'm screwed no matter what I fling at them."

"They won't be," Dana's confident tone was reassuring. "These guys are all about brute force. They have strength and they can leap an impressive distance from a standstill, but they can't convert that power into speed." The woman took Tessa's hand, poured the handful of pale kernels into her open palm. "And their compulsion is your best defense."

"The best defense is a good offense," Tessa muttered shoving the seeds back into her pocket.

"You just concentrate on staying out of the line of fire long enough for your offense to show up, young lady," Dana answered, her eyes hardening, "Let me handle the fighting."

"I know, I know, I get it, okay?" The last thing Tessa wanted was another reminder that she was playing the damsel in distress, waiting for her knight in shining armor to charge in and save her, especially when said knight wasn't interested in the traditional post-rescue reward. "Now, if you'll excuse me," she huffed, feeling thoroughly put out, "I have to go hunt down whatever's left of your surprise dinner."

Dana laid a restraining hand on Tessa's disgruntled shoulder. When she had the girl's attention, she performed a showy little presenters' sidestep revealing the battered yet still intact take-out bag. The redhead then lifted the bag on her forefinger grinning impishly. "So, am I good enough to be in your show _now_ , Ricky?" she quipped in a high-pitched Lucy Ricardo-like lilt.

Tessa struggled against a rising wave of giggles— _Dammit, I set her up and she gets the punchline?_—but there was no defense against that puckish expression. Her resentment collapsed and so did her constraint. She couldn't stop laughing for a full five minutes.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

8:23pm

 

Their meal had survived its little adventure surprisingly well. Dana savored every bite using her extra portion of ginger dressing as a dipping sauce and delighting Tessa by rolling her eyes heavenward in pleasure from time to time.

When they were both finished the redhead leaned back in her chair and breathed a happy sigh. "That was wonderful and worth every bit of the intestinal cramping I'm about to live through."

"I'll let Madeline know her suggestion was well received," Tessa said smiling, "but I won't mention your peculiar digestive issues when it comes to solid foods."

Dana stared at her abdomen. "God, what I wouldn't do for a detailed ultrasound and a CAT scan," she mourned then returned her gaze to the young PN. "Speaking of Madeline, would you walk me through this vision again? I was a bit—distracted earlier."

"It's Moon Over Bangkok. If you _hadn't_ been distracted I would have questioned your sanity," Tessa quipped and was surprised to note a fleeting glimpse of alarm in her friend's eyes.

_What was that about?_ Tessa wondered. She wished there was some way to bring it up without triggering Dana's ire, but as close as they were and as much as they shared, there were certain lines she was not allowed to cross. Dana did not invite intimacies. Any infringement on her personal space, no matter how well-meaning, was met with a kind yet firm two-word rebuff: I'm fine. So, Tessa only repeated the details of her colleague's prediction and waited for a response—and continued to wait as the silence grew to a cumbersome size.

Eventually Dana broke the uncomfortable stillness with an awkward clearing of her throat, "Your friend doesn't actually believe I'm an angel, right?"

"Not even a little. What Madeline sees is mostly symbolic in nature."

"Symbolic," Dana repeated in dubious tones.

"Precognition isn't an exact science. The visions aren't meant to be taken literally most of the time."

" _Most_ of the time?"

Tessa frowned over the remains of her caliente roll. "Give her some credit, would you? What she feels when she's experiencing a precognitive trance is pretty straight forward and she self-interprets. Most precogs have two or three full time interpreters and they still don't achieve a quarter of Madeline's accuracy."

"Forgive my doubts, but when it comes to premonitions, I haven't had the most positive of experiences," was Dana's sardonic response. 

"Madeline is _not_ the Stupendous Yappi," she snapped and Dana recoiled, eyebrows raised.

"Sorry, Dana, it's just—" Tessa ran her hands over her head in frustration. "PNs take a lot of shit in general, but precogs get the worst of it every time."

A knowing smile rose to Dana's lips, "You like her, don't you?"

"That has nothing to do with it," Tessa stated with self-conscious formality.  

The smile turned into a smirk, "Not even a little?"

"Would you quit with the impromptu matchmaking?"

Tessa flicked a leftover grain of rice at that grinning visage. The morsel of food came to a halt in midair, hovered at the tip of Dana's nose for a moment then glided humbly back to Tessa's plate.

"Monica taught you better than to play with your food, sweetie."

"Show off."

Dana chuckled. "I'm just doing what you told me to, actively utilizing my new-found abilities and treating them as natural extensions of my physical self." She sobered at the younger woman's scowl, "Come on, Tessa. Can you blame me for wishing you'd meet someone?"

"No." Tessa paused to force the hurt down. "No, I don't, but Madeline isn't single and besides," her shoulders rose in a guilty shrug, "she's a channel."

"Should that mean something to me?"

It was Tessa's turn to laugh softly. "I do keep forgetting that you don't know all the terminology. It means she's a magnet for bodiless entities."

At Dana's blank look Tessa shook her head in weary chagrin. "Okay, you know what a medium is, right? Well they're a little like that except mediums don't bond with what they attract. Where mediums are straight conduits for communication, channels physically _become_ the spirit's tie to the physical world."

"So you're telling me this girl not only tells the future, she's also possessed," Dana stated, eyeing the PN warily.

Tessa chortled at the archaic reference. "Possessed? This isn't the Middle Ages, Dana!"

"Then what is she—haunted?"

There it was again, a brief flicker of nerves just under the surface of Dana's amused dubiousness. And what was with that pause before the word haunted? Something was causing the ex-agent distress and she was trying very hard not to show it.

"No, she's not that either," Tessa answered sympathetically. "Hauntings are always unhealthy because the beings there are trapped, tied to the physical structure or location. But with channels, the spirits are there by mutual consent. Madeline's entities are her family, closer than family. They share things with her that I never could." Her face fell, "And I don't share well. The jealousy would eat me alive."

"You are your father's daughter," Dana's softly spoken comment was lined with compassion.

"Tell me about it."

Tessa stood plate in hand only to have it vanish from her grasp. Dana was at the kitchen sink before she could object, not that she would. Little acts of domesticity soothed the older woman and Tessa wanted all the calmatives she could get. Her inner investigator was piqued. There was a mystery buried here and she was about to go digging, wrist-slapping and 'I'm fines' be damned.

"Did you know that telepathic receivers can sometimes be mistaken for mediums at first?" said Tessa in her best interesting trivia tone. "Since both talents involve listening with the mind and not the ear, working out where the voices are coming from can be hard on trainees."

There was no response save the sound of hissing water pouring from the faucet onto Dana's hands.

"Shielding is tricky too," she added, trying a different angle. "Telepaths have the option to block everything but mediums can't. They need to keep a line open or risk missing a spiritual contact."

There was a rattle of china on metal as the dish in Dana's fingers slipped. "Really?" she asked taking a firmer grip on the sudsy plate. "And how does one—keep a line open?"

"I don't know. I'd have to ask a medium." Tessa sidled beside the redhead, ducking down to better see her face. "Dana—have you been in mental contact with someone?"

Dana took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "Not lately."

"But you were."

Dana nodded then started soaping up the silverware.

"Do you know who?"

"Does it matter?"

"It always matters."

There was no warning. One moment Dana was calm, the next she was fuming "Why?" she barked, slamming down the fork she had been rinsing. "What will it prove?"

Tessa met Dana's heated stare with a forced calm she didn't quite feel. "It'll prove that you can say your partner's name in polite conversation, for one thing."

As Dana's resentment dissolved into hurt, Tessa knew she'd hit pay dirt but there was no joy in the discovery, only the unhappy knowledge that she'd just shoved a knife into her best friend's heart. Unable to hold that pained regard, she found an interesting chip at the edge of the Formica counter to stare at.

"Shit, Dana, don't look at me that way. You never talk about the man. The only time you've ever said his name to me you were too pissed off to edit yourself. I'm not stupid. I can put two and two together and figure out that you don't react like this over anyone but Fox Mulder."

"Don't call him Fox," Dana said, hands dripping as she turned away from the counter. "He hated Fox." Four measured steps took the redhead to the far side of the kitchen. Once there she crossed her arms protectively and leaned forward until her forehead and part of one shoulder rested against the pale stucco wall.

Tessa first cursed her mind and then her mouth wishing, not for the first time, that she were more like her mother. Monica Reyes had been the diplomat, the comforter, the one who always knew how to end an argument or alleviate a painful situation. Her mom would have known what to say to make this right; she did not.

"I'm sorry I hurt you," Tessa made the peace offering in a gentle voice, barely above a whisper. "I didn't mean to. I wouldn't have brought him up at all except I didn't know what else to do. Why don't you trust me, Dana?"

"I _do_ trust you." The words were muttered to the wall.

"If that's true then why all the secrecy? Did you think I wouldn't believe you?"

"Of course not."

"Then why not tell me that you were speaking to him?"

Dana's stiffened shoulders slumped in defeat. "Because I'm not sure if it _was_ him," was her faint reply.

Unwelcome shades of the old Dana, frightened, fraught with anguish and haunted by uncertainty, echoed through the room and Tessa despaired at the sound. Her primary responsibility as a mentor was to help Dana navigate the rugged emotional terrain that came with being a PN. Her first consideration should have been her student's vulnerabilities, except that _this_ student was such an expert at hiding weakness from others, especially her.

Liam was right; she was too young, too inexperienced to play mentor to anyone, much less to this woman some fifty years her senior. The trouble was she was all Dana had.

"I understand how that would be a concern," Tessa said, carefully choosing each word she spoke. "This is why CPER uses the mentorship system, so new PNs always have someone knowledgeable and familiar to guide them. Let me be your guide, Dana. I know that between the two of us we can work through this rationally. Please?"

The silence felt years long. At long last Dana spoke two gruff words, "I'm listening."

Tessa released the breath she had been holding. "Okay, as I see it we have two possibilities. One: another telepathic PN could have been trying to destabilize you through mental deception or psychic fraud. Knowing what I do about these vampire elders of yours, I'd bet they hate you enough to give psy-fraud a shot but I'd also bet that their chances of success would be godawful."

"It must be possible though or you wouldn't have suggested such a thing."

"I can't say it's impossible," Tessa reluctantly allowed, "but I can't stress enough how difficult it is to accomplish. First, one would have to find a telepath willing to go along with the scam. Senders do not like to lie mind-to-mind, Dana. Covering up an untruth requires a lot of energy and I've been told that lying can be physically painful. Second, said telepath would need to know Fo—ah, Mulder to deceive you, and I mean _really_ know him, inside and out. Reading the tell-all books and e-zines would not be enough. A close family member _might_ manage it, and fun-fact for you, every incidence of successful mental deception ever documented was perpetrated by a sibling."

"He has no close family left," Dana said sotto voce. "And his sister's gone."

Tessa nodded. "Which leaves you; you who've known this man more intimately than anyone else alive. Your mind would instantly recognize and reject an imposter. You wouldn't be questioning the contact, which brings me to the likelier of our two possibilities."

"Go on."

"It really _was_ Mulder reaching out to you, trying to help you. Knowing how close you two were, it wouldn't surprise me if your souls are linked. His spirit may not be able to move on until he's certain you'll be okay without him."

Tessa didn't have to see Dana's face; she could feel the disbelief radiating from her in waves. "Look," she said stubbornly, "I know all this must sound pretty farfetched, but in my experience a linked soul's refusal to part from his mate makes a lot more sense than the idea of some schmuck PN bullshitting you, vampire elders or no vampire elders."

Dana tilted her head, one tired, jaundiced eye rising to peer at her over her shoulder. "But what if there's a third option you're not considering?"

"Like what?"

"I may be going insane."

"You are _not_ going insane."

"And on what evidence do you base that assertion?"

"I'd _feel_ it, Dana."

"Your feelings are not what I'd call irrefutable proof."

Once again, they had reached this all too familiar impasse. Growing up in the post-Revelation world, with all things paranormal confirmed, Tessa did not question the reality of what she _felt_. Dana, on the other hand, came from a very different background where para-science was synonymous with pseudoscience, psychics were charlatans, and anything extrasensory was regarded with suspicion. None of the documented breakthroughs and discoveries of the last twenty-six years seemed to apply when she aimed her precisely constructed skepticism at the subject.

Tessa sighed in resignation, "If you won't accept my _feelings_ , will you at least let me _see_ if there's anything wrong?"

"Please explain to me why seeing is any different, Tessa?" Dana grumbled, rubbing her forehead irritably.

The PN clenched her jaw and counted to five before coolly responding, "Because what I _see_ is quantifiable." _And you know it,_ she thought but did not add. "I am a living, breathing radiology department. Hell, I'm _better_ than any of those machines—and I'm a lot cheaper to maintain."

The silly little jibe was a much-needed tension breaker. The visible corner of Dana's mouth quirked upwards, her body lost some of its rigidity, and the knot of strain in Tessa's chest eased.

"Give me a chance, huh?" she pleaded softly. "What have you got to lose?"

Dana pivoted to face her; they locked eyes across the room, and for the second time that day the base of Tessa's skull prickled in recognition. Power had risen between them, a single beam of focused energy reaching for her through Dana's piercing stare.

Where a wiser person might have blocked the force or limited its reach, Tessa bared herself fearlessly, trusting the source. She _felt_ the beam connect then branch out into multiple questing tendrils, analyzing her in a way she'd never before experienced. She wondered if Dana was conscious of what she was doing. Was the examination intentional or instinctive? And why had she never noticed that Dana's irises were more green than blue?

A pull of excitement gripped Tessa's loins. _Shit!_ She moved to suppress the arousal a second too late. The unnamed power drew back, its startled owner turning away with a strangled gasp.

"Dana—"

 A wave of the redhead's hand silenced her. "Alright, I give. What do you need me to do?"

"Huh?" Her sudden acquiescence had Tessa scrambling for a different response. "Uh, nothing. I mean nothing yet, as in not tonight. I don't think either of us is up for it. How about tomorrow?"

Dana gave a quick nod then hastened from the kitchen. Tessa watched her flee with growing distress. Her libido, once an insignificant thing, had become a constant source of frustration. The timing of her unintended bursts of desire—always when it seemed like Dana was opening up—made her want to tear her hair out strand by strand. She'd never been punished for wanting someone before.

That thought turned frustration to anger. She was tired of feeling like the stupid (and perpetually horny) virgin in those bodice-rippers her mother had loved, tired of being penalized for an arousal she could not control, tired of letting Dana use that arousal as an excuse to keep her distance. She would not accept another wedge driven between them.

Tessa raced for the front door. "Dana, wait!" she shouted

Dana was standing in the darkened foyer shrugging on her coat. "I need to get going, Tess. It's late."

"And I know you hate to run, so why not stay here tonight? Save yourself the round trip back?"

"That's not a good idea." She wouldn't meet Tessa's eyes.

"Why?"

"I have my reasons."

Just as Dana reached for the door knob Tessa leaned against the jam, holding the door closed with her weight. "Is my sexual interest one of your reasons?"

An irritated exhale was Dana's initial response. "You really don't want me to answer that question."

"You know I can't help what I feel—"

"What you feel is nothing but infatuation—"

"—but I _can_ help what I do about it—"

"— intensified by whatever attractant my body releases to draw in prey."

"—I am _not_ going to force myself on you, if that's what you're so worried about."

There came a squeal of protesting metal as Dana gripped the brass handle. "I would make you very sorry if you tried." Every syllable was an ice coated blade.

"I _wouldn't_ try. So why not stay?"

Dana let go of the knob, freeing her hand to rub her eyebrows with rigid fingers. "Tessa," She raised her exasperated face to the brunette. "Okay, you want to know why I won't stay? Fine, this is why. In approximately forty minutes my intestines will start to cramp, then they will seize, at which point the contractions begin. I use the word contractions because that is what they feel like when my body ejects the solid foods I've eaten. Would you like to know which orifices expel the undigested waste? Or how painful the process is, how unnatural, how _monstrous_ I feel while it's happening?" A tear escaped one of Dana's furious eyes. She scrubbed the drop violently out of existence before it could reach her cheek.

"No, I'd rather know why you insist on going through all that—that horror alone?" was Tessa's trembling response. "Why do you isolate yourself when you don't have to?"

Dana's mouth opened, closed, opened again. When it was clear no other reply was forthcoming Tessa continued, "Here's my counter proposal. Stay here tonight. Take the master bedroom with the connecting bath. Fill the tub and soak until it's over, then crawl into bed and sleep it off. In the morning I can help you with clean-up, or if you can't deal with that you can take care of the mess yourself. But whatever you do, do it here, in the light, supported by someone who cares about you, not in that dark, lifeless hovel hiding like an ogre."

For a moment Dana could only stare then, with a muttered oath, she drew Tessa's shaking body into her arms.

"You have got some nerve, Tessa." Dana's wry comment held a note of admiration.

"You said it yourself, I'm my father's daughter."

Dana held back a laugh. "That mouth of yours—" she hesitated then said in a husky whisper, "Mulder would have liked you."

_She said his name. Holy shit, Dana said his name! She said Mulder! To me! On purpose!_ As Tessa's heart did a celebratory conga, Tessa gave her a quick squeeze before moving shyly away. "I was under the impression that he didn't like my dad."

"Not exactly, it's complicated."

"Will you tell me about him—him and dad? Sometime?" At Dana's affirmative nod Tessa's heart leapt into Rockette-style high kicks. "And you'll stay?"

"I haven't ripped your door off its hinges, have I?"

Tessa grinned. "The night's not over."

"Smartass."

"Hey, you started it!"

As they bickered Tessa extended a tentative hand. It was taken without pause.

Dana let herself be led back into the light.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "King of Pain" – The Police

                                             "Mad World" – Gary Jules

                                             "The Chain" – Fleetwood Mac

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again fellow readers. I hope some of you are still around. I wish I could extract this story from my brain with more speed, if only because I hate the thought of torture, which this must be for you all. Once more, let me assure you that I'm not going anywhere and I will finish this, no matter what nature *cough-Huricane Irma-cough* throws at me.
> 
> Big Cat-5 sized thank yous to all who have left kudos and comments. I do love to hear your thoughts, so feel free to drop a line. :)


	14. Interlude II-Uninvited

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For Dana, self-analysis is both boon and bane. Meanwhile, one of the consortium's ranking members considers his next move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Consider this the calm before the next storm.

Reyes-Doggett Home

Washington, DC

September 13, 2042 -- 11:10pm

 

The master bath was a marvel, a miracle of design and modern technology. At first glance no one would guess that the modest walk-in shower could, at a single spoken word, expand to a two-man soaking tub in under a minute complete with your choice of Jacuzzi seats, a full-body recliner or support-free floating. Hidden spa jets were set to massage all the right places. The hand-held shower-head doubled as a warm-air dryer. A multimedia display was built into one wall, projecting an image that merged seamlessly with the tea rose marble tiles when not in use. For Dana Scully, this was heaven on Earth.

She was enjoying her fifth soak this week, eyes half-lidded in pleasure as pulses of hot, foamy water comfortably pummeled her submerged body. _I think I know how George Bailey felt in the last few minutes of "It's a Wonderful Life,"_ she thought ruefully.

Against her better judgement, the house where John and Monica had raised their children had become her main base of operations and unexpected escape space. There was no point in denying the convenience of having a residence in DC, when she was spending so much time in the area, the surroundings were as familiar to her as her place in Virginia, and then there was the siren song of this luxurious bathroom, installed sometime after her ultimate withdrawal from the Reyes-Doggett family. After last weekend's tumultuous events Dana stopped resisting fate and took up the long-standing invitation to remain in Tessa's childhood home. Not surprisingly, Tessa had been overjoyed.

"First, I can hardly convince you to stay one night, now I can't get you to leave!" she had crowed. "Go ahead and stay. Hell, _live_ in the bathtub for all I mind, you hedonist, but when the water bill comes in, you're paying it."

As Dana's thoughts focused on Tessa so did her senses, her enhanced hearing tuning in on the girl's deep, slow breaths. She smiled tenderly. The poor, exhausted thing had labored to stay awake all through this evening's dinner, dozing off repeatedly while trying to recount her friend Madeline's latest prediction—something about a terrorist attack—until Dana demanded that she go to bed. That she retreated to her old room upstairs without a fight and only one half-yawned joke ("You're just getting rid of me so you can take another five-hour bath; you trying to grow gills in there or what?") was a testament to her fatigue.

_I'm wearing her out_ , Dana thought with a touch of guilt, _I need to stop leaning on her so much._ _But her eyes, my God, her eyes!_

Tessa's claim of being a walking, talking radiology department was no idle boast. The young woman could study every minute change in Dana's body in exquisite detail, from her thickening bone structure to her evolving internal organs. No x-ray machine, CT scanner or magnetic resonance imager on Earth could compare. And the best part was that _anyone_ could be the observer.

Approximately five percent of paranormals were also capable of linking minds with another individual, allowing him or her to experience their extrasensory gifts firsthand. Piggy-backing, as it was known in the US, was a genetic trait, akin to having a hypermobile joint or dimples; Tessa had the piggy-backing gene.

Dana was hooked. Day after day she monopolized Tessa's free time, captivated by what she was able to observe through the other woman's eyes. The physician in her was frankly astonished that hospitals weren't lining up patients at Tessa's door, but then she also couldn't account for why the medical community as a whole was so averse to the paranormal population in the first place.

'First cast out the beam from thine own eye,' spoke the solemn toned memory of her father, 'then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote from thy brother's." Matthew, chapter 7, verse 5. Ahab had loved the ancient phrase, quoting it with a wry smile whenever he found one of his children on the road to hypocrisy, a path his youngest daughter was certainly on if she could so easily overlook her own reluctance to accept the incontestable reality of the para-sciences.

Only a fool could be blind to the irony. She, the uncompromising medical doctor, the dyed-in-the-wool skeptic, the hardline scientist and intended debunker of the X-Files, was an undying, psychic, vampire-alien-human hybrid obsessed with staring at herself through another psychic's eyes. Her reversal of fortune was now complete.

Somewhere out there Mulder must surely be laughing. At least she hoped he was.

"Okay, Mulder, here goes nothing," she murmured and cleared her mind.

Slowly, lovingly, Dana shaped the man from memory, lingering over all of his endearing quirks, his charm, his frustrating habits, building him from the mind up as only she could. Then, using Tessa's suggestions as her guide, she visualized a miniscule opening in her shield, a single point, smaller than the head of a pin, and superimposed that memory over it, directing the tiny hole to allow safe passage to this one, solitary individual.

There, she'd opened a channel. If his spirit was still present on this plane, he would be able to reach her.

Her bath gone tepid, she rose from the tub, her thoughts as heavy as her dripping frame. She did not want Mulder to be dead but was there really any point in continuing to hold out hope? She considered the possibilities while drying her skin and hair beneath the steaming air blowing from the shower-head.

Assuming he had somehow managed to escape Ronnie Strickland's murderous wrath, Mulder would be an octogenarian now, a month shy of his eighty-first birthday. At that advanced age he'd need some form of medical care, and with such care came blood typing, DNA identification and ultimately discovery. Since no one had come forward to announce that they had found the infamous ex-special agent at their local doctor's office, and she doubted that even his considerable charisma could convince a GP's entire staff to keep mum, there was nothing left for her willing suspension of disbelief to grasp.

Pain struck Dana like a blade, sharp and cold, as bitter tears ran down her face. To her it felt as if she'd lost Mulder this very moment and not over two decades ago. Accepting the inevitable, irrevocable fact of his passing was to recognize that she truly was alone.

No, she still had Tessa. Dear, sweet, Tessa, who had given selflessly of her time and energy, wearing herself out over and over again without complaint. Compassionate, hardheaded, Tessa, whose support, encouragement and stubborn tenacity had been instrumental to her new lease on life. Strongminded, uncompromising, Tessa, who insisted she be taken seriously as a friend, acknowledged as an equal—

—and who loved her desperately.

To claim Tessa was gripped by simple infatuation was an untruth; Tessa's feelings for her were growing stronger, not weaker, as time went by.

To maintain that there was no answering response in her was fast becoming another untruth.

Wrapped in her old, terrycloth robe, Dana moved through the silent house, pacing from room to room as she tried to make sense of the nonsensical. Her growing attraction to Tessa was illogical, it flew in the face of reason, and it was persistent. Manageable, but persistent.

"I do not want to fuck John and Monica's daughter," she growled under her breath.

That _was_ true on the face of it. Her desire was rooted in emotions that a simple roll in the hay was unlikely to solve. Besides, she _had_ fucked the girl once already—she'd successfully recovered her memories of that first hunger-induced night soon after she began feeding regularly—and her recollection of the experience was decidedly unsatisfying.

Dana didn't want sex. She didn't want some casual fling or shallow friends-with-benefits relationship. What she desired was something deeper, meaningful, more substantial than someone of Tessa's youth and limited experience could possibly give her. So why was she unable to reconcile her feelings with wisdom?

'Because love doesn't always follow your rules or your expectations, Dana,' came the laughing voice of a new ghost from her past, her sister, Melissa.

"I am not in love with her," she shot back before she could stop herself. _Arguing with figments, Dana; not a good sign_. She knew without a doubt now that she wasn't going insane—thanks again to Tessa and her astounding sight—but these bouts of vivid recall sometimes did a number on her nerves.

The fact was she couldn't be certain that she _wasn't_ falling in love with Tessa. She was showing all the classic signs; constantly thinking about the girl, missing her when she wasn't around, and when she _was_ present, fighting the urge to be near her, to lean against her, to touch her. No argument she made could stand under the weight of all the empirical evidence to the contrary.

Dana's relentless wandering led her to the foot of the stairs. There she hesitated then grudgingly moved away, firmly telling herself that she didn't need to see Tessa. As manageable as her yearning was, in her current tumultuous state of mind, she didn't want to take a chance. If she looked at her she might succumb to the urge to curl up in bed with her, and then—well, better to avoid that slippery slope altogether.

Instead she trudged back to the master bedroom, considered drawing another bath, decided against it, then slipped out of her robe and sagged sideways into the empty bed.

"Time," Dana muttered, tugging the top sheet up to her chin. "I just need time. These feelings will pass. I'll get past this. She'll get past this. We just need time." After chanting this unusual mantra, she closed her eyes and consigned herself to getting some rest.

Except she didn't feel at all sleepy. And the sheets were cold. _Dammit._

Reaching out blindly, Dana grasped one of the bed's many pillows and pulled it to her chest. She didn't want to fight her needs anymore this evening. Turning her back on propriety, she cuddled the pillow and let her brain handle the rest.

With the sound of Tessa's deep, slow breaths humming in her ears and the imagined feel of Tessa's warm weight in her arms, Dana was eventually lulled into sleep where questions of moral ambiguity would not disturb her.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

Elder Stephen rose heavily from his seat at the table, as always, the last to leave the conference area. The information revealed there tonight had resulted in much heated discussion and displays of hostility from the others. He remained pensively silent throughout.

_Let the children quarrel_ , he'd thought. _When they've used up their energy, cooler heads will prevail._

Cooler heads had prevailed, for the moment. His head. As the oldest member of the consortium, his judgement held the most gravity, enough to sway the others from moving against the perceived threat. For now.

A gust of wind blew against the building, the shatter-proof glass windows holding firm against their age-old enemy. Winter was coming and his old bones ached with its frigid approach. How he wished to return to his home, turn the thermostat up as high as it would go and bake in bed until the heat put him to sleep. Unfortunately, there was no rest for the wicked or the responsible.

There was a phone at the rear of the long room. He picked up the handset and dialed, pleased that the number came to his fingers without hesitation though he'd only ever dialed it once before. His kind were blessed with excellent recall, never diminished by the passage of time. The call connected on the first ring.

"Dammit Jim Bob, what the hell is it now?"

"Lucius," he replied with a hint of amusement. "Your language is as colorful as ever, I see."

There was silence on the other line, a silence Stephan allowed to grow.

"Master."

"You remember the old ways still. That's good."

"Master, forgive me, I wasn't expecting—"

"I have no need of your apologies, Lucius, I have need of your ears and your mind. Are both engaged now?"

"Yes, sir—Master."

"Excellent. She's awake, Lucius."

"Master?"

"Our phoenix, risen from her bed of ashes. She is testing her wings, Lucius. Soon she will take to the skies. Do you understand me now?"

A softly groaned string of curses was Lucius' reply. The Elder let the poor man vent them without castigation. "Yes, I see that you do. I'm sure you also understand the delicate nature of your position."

"Master, I swear to you—"

"I need your declarations as much as I need your apologies," Stephan cut him off with a hiss, "What I _want_ is a guarantee that you will keep your motley tribe in check."

"I-I will, Master."

"Do I sense hesitation?"

"N-no, Master. No."

"Need I remind you of the consequences if you're not successful?"

"No, Master."

"Good." He sighed inwardly, hating to threaten, yet knowing that, sometimes, one good threat went further than a dozen kind gestures. "I would hate to see your flock disappear for good this time."

"No, Master. But—" Again the silence grew lengthy. "—What do I tell them? What should I say?"

"You were a sheriff once, Lucius," he replied patiently. " Tell them what they want to hear and with as little truth as possible. That is how the humans do it."

"Yes, Master."

"My regards to Jim Bob," he finished and laid the handset back on its cradle. There, the unpleasant part was done. Now, back to the issue at hand.

The girl was the key, of course. Easy enough to continue their deep surveillance and, if necessary, they could move on the girl, though he prayed that would not be required. He did not believe eliminating the youth would put an end to their problem. On the contrary, he believed such an act would exacerbate it. A phoenix rose in fire; to douse the creature in gasoline would be a grave error.

He'd read many works of human literature, an uncommon habit many of his kind still found distasteful. He, on the other hand, found human stories to be both soothing and enlightening. One could learn much of the other lifeform's society through their myths and legends, their hopes and dreams, and yes, their nightmares.

One such nightmarish beast was known as a Hydra. Cut off the head of a Hydra and another two grew to replace it. This legend had blared like an alarm in his mind when the consortium had demanded the decapitation of Dana Scully in a final attempt to rid themselves of her contaminated existence. Fearing what could grow in its place, he had argued strenuously against the move. His triumph over his colleagues was not seen as an act of mercy, nor was it intended as one. Hers was to be a half-life filled with suffering, madness and eventual mindlessness. He had grossly underestimated the woman's spirit.

She was truly a monster by the old Latin definition: a divine thing, an omen from the gods.

Yet Stephan did not regret his past actions. The monster still had only one head, after all, and said cranium had shown no desire to move against them. Gods willing, no one would give her reason to go on the offensive. The situation was still manageable, provided certain other elements were kept in check. Thus, his warning to Mr. Hartwell.

He sighed deeply as he made his slow way out of the building, bundled tightly into his long, wool coat. Just as the seasons changed, so did the world. He believed he'd read the portent of Ms. Scully's unprecedented infection rightly; his kind needed to progress beyond their current existence. Some of the younger generation were coming around to his way of thinking, pushing for change. This gave him hope.

_The future is for the young_ , he thought as he slipped into the heated sanctuary of his car, _for they shall inherit the Earth_.

On his way home, he made one more call. His conversation with Vincent was much more agreeable. Vincent had instantly understood the need to keep a weather-wise eye on the situation without jumping to rash action. An old soul for all the boy was barely past his first century.

Yes, the future was for the young. Stephan intended to see his legacy inherited well.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "Chasing Cars" – Snow Patrol

                                             "Uninvited" – Alanis Morissette

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's very early morning here, fellow readers, and I'm one very tuckered individual, but I think I'll sleep better knowing I posted this latest interlude before crawling into bed. I'm happy to have gotten us through the end of the beginning - now to the loop-delooping middle of this rollercoaster of a story. 
> 
> NSFW note: Delving into Scully's head is better than sex (at least for me it is).
> 
> Deep gratitude to the roomie for helping me give my Elder his perfect name, and my eternal gratitude to you all for reading, commenting and kudo-ing.
> 
> If any of you have a thought you'd like to share, please do comment. I'm interested in your thoughts and feelings on the progression of the tale.


	15. Chapter 12-Stand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A terrorist threat looms over DC, placing Tessa at loggerheads with both CPER and Dana.  
> Note: This chapter hints at a terrorist bombing - reader discretion is advised.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The good news: This chapter poured out of me so I get to post it much earlier than expected. :)  
> The bad news: Well, you'll see...

Centers for Paranormal & Extraterrestrial Research

Washington, DC

September 11 to September 23, 2042

 

Exactly thirteen days before the bombing, the visions began; precognitives all over the Eastern Seaboard faced with terrifying images of the National Mall burning, the White House in flames, the Lincoln Memorial turned to rubble. By morning precogs as far away as San Francisco were envisioning the same horrible sights. Within forty-eight hours the prediction was a global phenomenon. Yet the bulk of the planet had no idea this was happening.

Ask any ten Paranormals why the prophesy was being kept from the non-talented majority and you were likely to get ten different answers all with the same overarching theme, they were afraid; they were afraid of not being believed, afraid of ridicule, afraid of harassment, afraid of what their governments might do to them. Under this shadow of fear, PNs the world over reached out to the one US agency they felt they could trust—

—And the paranormal avalanche came crashing down on CPER's fledgling shoulders. Fortunately, CPER was prepared.

When their own precog unit began reporting visions of DC's destruction, the board was notified and CPER went on high alert. Spurred by the steadily increasing deluge of reports coming in, emergency training sessions in search and rescue and disaster response were held. For those with kinetic and perceptual senses, the sessions were mandatory. Spontaneous evacuation drills were triggered so often that employees on the higher floors joked about getting free cardio workouts. Managers read and reread the emergency procedures manual until they were smudged and dog-eared. The precogs were kept busy pinpointing target sights while assorted mental and metaphysical talents sought out and gathered intel on the masterminds.

This was just the kind of opportunity CPER's directors were waiting for. If PNs could work together to prevent such a tragedy it would go a long way toward proving their usefulness to the doubters and naysayers and it was hoped that the good press would also diffuse some of the anger fueling the Naturalist movement.

To any outside observer it was business as usual, but once you got past the tour group route, the place was a pressure cooker. Before long tempers were flaring with arguments breaking out over the smallest matters. Madeline Cross collapsed under the intense strain and had to be hospitalized. Everyone was on edge. When D-Day dawned, the entire organization greeted it with various combinations of relief and anticipation.

At 9:00am on September 23rd, a meeting was held with directors of intelligence from the FBI, Homeland Security and the Metropolitan Police Department, during which CPER's board delivered everything they had on the plot: a Naturalist terror group calling themselves Pure Americans for Glory would begin planting bombs throughout the DC area that evening. Each C-4 packed explosive device was wrapped in a state flag, one bomb for every state in the union. They would all be set to detonate at precisely 11:30am, Eastern Daylight Time, on September 24th, the following day.

The paranormal community held their combined breaths.

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

September 24, 2042 -- 11:15am

 

CPER's first response teams were huddled in the "ready-room," a.k.a. the cafeteria, eyes trained on their cell phone news feeds or the mounted flat screen monitor tuned to the local NBC affiliate. Most of them had been here since dawn, drinking gallons of coffee and pretending they'd gotten some sleep the night before. There was little conversation to be found among the normally garrulous groups. They all knew they were playing a waiting game.

"I hate this," grumbled a Nordic blonde bearded giant of a man clutching two fresh cups of joe as he returned to his recently departed seat. Dressed in chinos and an electric blue flannel shirt, he looked more like a lumberjack than a PN. Gently he slid one of the two Styrofoam cups under his teammate's veil of dark hair. "I can't stand waiting, T. Never could. I wish I could piggy-back some of your calm."

"You don't want to piggy-back this, Bear," Tessa Reyes replied, closing her eyes against a wave of nausea. "And can you quit calling me T?" She took a deep, coffee-scented breath of steam through her nose and willed her stomach to behave.

For the past three hours she'd been pretending her malaise was just nerves but the throbbing drumbeat at the base of her skull could no longer be denied. She hadn't experienced a _feeling_ this scarily intense since she was a kid.

"That's B to you," he said, nudging her arm amicably. "Remember what the trainer said. We need to use single syllable identifiers with long e sounds."

Tessa sighed. "That's when we're out _there_. In here it's Tessa or Tess, okay?"

Bear's intended reply was preempted by a long, low, rolling boom. Several murmured epithets followed. While no one at CPER voiced their hopes aloud, there had been a consensus of quiet optimism that all the bombs would be found in time. The ominous rumble was nothing less than the sound of their combined dreams collapsing.

The tension along Tessa's spine ratcheted up considerably. A second later cell phones all over the room began to hoot, buzz or chime their various alerts. At the same moment the Days of Our Lives: New Millennium rerun on the monitor was replaced by a bright red breaking news screen.

"And there it goes," Bear sighed just as another distant, muted blast rolled through the air.

"Alright people!" Tessa turned towards the shout. Framed by the doorway was a navy-blue jacketed trio, FBI blazoned in glaring yellow letters on their arms and across their left breasts. "Intel is coming in, we have two, I repeat, two locations! Everybody find your partner and grab a vest! We're rolling in ten!"    

Another wave of nausea swept over Tessa as she tried to stand. _Something's wrong_ , she thought as she braced her arms on the table. _Something's very wrong._

"Here, T." Bear was holding out one of the eye-wateringly yellow EMS vests. "Hey, you okay?"

"Yeah," she answered, taking the mesh material from him with numb fingers. "Just nerves. I'm fine."

"I feel ya," Bear murmured, helping her up with a feeble smile. "It'll get better now that we're moving."

Yet the sensation of _wrong_ did not dissipate. The nausea and the pounding against her occipital bone worsened the closer she and Bear got to the three FBI agents who were busily dividing them into teams. _Wrong-wrong-wrong_ the _feeling_ insisted, urging her to look behind her at the monitor.

The flat screen was dark. Floating in the center, in screaming capital letters, were two words: NO SIGNAL.

Tessa pulled her cell phone from her pants pocket and tried to open a news site. She got an 'unable to connect' error message. She tried to pull up her search engine instead. The same error message appeared. She turned off her wi-fi and tried again using just her phone's 6G network. And the message appeared for a third time. She swallowed her rising gorge and gripped Bear's thick forearm.

"Still bad, T?"

She ignored the question, staring intently up into his broad face, "Tell me you don't feel it."

Bi-talents typically had matched gifts, abilities either on the same bar of the spectrum or 'next-door-neighbors.' Bear, on the other hand, had a more uncommon arrangement; he was an enhanced strength kinetic paired with metaphysical perception. Having gifts on opposite ends of the spectrum, the two had a tendency to interact in odd ways that were, in his words, "more of a headache then they're worth most times." However, when he wasn't engaged in feats of super-human strength, he was damn good at gauging if something was amiss.

Sure enough, the hulk-sensitive's mouth was a hard line, his eyes haunted. He looked like an animal in a trap with no way to get free.

Deep within Tessa, the anger dragon stirred, opening its eager eyes and stretching its wings in anticipation. Her nausea vanished, subdued by her growing sense of outrage. She shoved her way to the front of the ragged line.

The agent in charge looked up from her clipboard in surprise. "I appreciate your enthus—"

"Shut up," Tessa snapped. "You're lying. Why?"

"I don't know what—"

"The fuck you don't know!" she snarled, eyes flashing dangerously. "We're psychics, get it? We _know_ that you know and I demand to know what!!!"

The woman took a swift step backward alarmed by what she saw in Tessa's face. Then a gnarled hand moved the nonplussed agent aside and Tessa was suddenly face-to-face with the oldest looking human being she had ever seen. His wizened features, wispy white hair, and short stature reminded her a little of the guy who'd played Bilbo Baggins in that first Lord of the Rings movie.

"Is there a problem here?" the elderly man asked her in a soft tenor. God, he even _sounded_ like Bilbo.

"Something's wrong, sir," she answered, struggling for composure. Though she'd never met the man she recognized _who_ he was, one of CPER's directors, one of the review board, one of the infamous Final Five. As difficult as it was to keep calm, what with mounting pressure from the anger dragon and the pounding drum in her head, losing her shit in front of a director would not be good for her career.

"I know," the wizened man replied grimly and raised his hands for attention, an unnecessary gesture as every face in the room was already riveted to his.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I'm guessing some of you are feeling like this young woman here," the director cum Bilbo clone said with an acknowledging nod Tessa's way. "That sense of wrongness is mainly due to some misleading information. You see, there were three successful detonations, not two as was initially reported. However, our orders have not changed. CPER is assisting in search and rescue at two sites."

"Who's got the third?" asked a puzzled sounding woman in the back. Tessa identified her vaguely as a sight-aura reader.

"That's not something the authorities share with the likes of me," he replied with a chuckle, a laugh that found muted echoes in the crowd. "But I'm certain the site is being given first-rate attention. They won't need us."

The lie crashed against Tessa's eardrums like twin gongs and the anger dragon rumbled its displeasure. "Bullshit," she muttered.

Director Bilbo's eyes narrowed before swiftly morphing into a perfect imitation of bewilderment. "Sorry, I didn't catch that miss—"

"Tessa Reyes, sir," she answered and then her mouth continued its thought before her brain could intercept, "and you're lying. I call bullshit."

"Are you implying that there are no first responders going to the third site?" he asked, his gentile tone hardening.

"No, but you're still lying," she lobbed right back at him. "They _do_ need us and you won't send us. _You_. Why?"

Director Bilbo closed his eyes. When he opened them again his kindly hobbit persona was gone. "Miss Reyes, everyone in this room, you included, is aware that Naturalists were the instigators of this crisis. Well, it just so happens that the third bomb site is sitting in the middle of the heaviest population of Naturalists in this city. That isn't coincidence, it's a trap. How do I know?" His tone turned mocking, "Because _I'm_ a psychic too."

"But if we don't go in then the Naturalists win!" Tessa argued, ignoring his contempt, "Why can we do the things we can do if it's not to help innocent people?"

The old man smiled dourly. "I think you're forgetting that we're inhuman freaks of nature to them. Innocent or not, they don't want our help."

"Then just send a few of us, the ones who can hide their abilities! They don't have to know—"  

"ENOUGH!" the director shouted, his voice ringing with strident wrath. "I WON'T SEND ANYONE TO THAT MISBEGOTTEN NEIGHBORHOOD, DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?"

Tessa stared into the director's infuriated face, her quaking body growing cold then hot by turns. This man's intolerant views were condemning people to die, a move as unethical, as offensive as the bombings themselves. She could not let the offense stand.

"Then I'll go myself." Her response sent rippling murmurs of shock through the gathered PNs.

The director lunged forward, his eyes filled with menace. "Are you a fool, Miss Reyes?"

"That's Reyes-Doggett to you," she fired back, staring him down with all of the anger dragon's considerable force. She would not be intimidated by his aggressive stance or his lofty position. She no longer cared about her career or her paycheck. At this moment only one thing held any meaning for her: the lives she could save.

"My mother and father and their partners are the reason CPER exists!" she shouted as she turned to face her colleagues.  "What this man is doing flies in the face of everything they stood for. They would _never_ have condoned his cowardice and neither will I. I'm going to the third site! Naturalists or no Naturalists, I will not let people die if I can help it! Who's coming with me?"

Tessa scanned the room eagerly for raised hands, listened for exclamations of agreement—

—She saw nothing but a few blank, frightened eyes; most wouldn't look at her at all. The only sound was a loud ringing in her ears, the sound of humiliation. The anger dragon's strength faltered; her proud demeanor dissolved.

"You didn't really expect them to answer your clarion call to action, did you Miss Reyes-Doggett?" the director asked, his darkly pitying smile crumbling her self-esteem further. "Luckily for them, they haven't been brainwashed by fairy tales. So, allow me to give you a much-needed dose of reality: Heroes aren't real. They're made up characters we tell our kids about so they don't kill each other on the playground before they're old enough to fuck. Real life is all about survival and real people aren't willing to risk their lives for nothing."

The director clapped Tessa's arm in a comradely we're-still-friends fashion and she struck it away, revolted by his touch. "Go to hell," she hissed at him through clenched teeth, then with a last despairing glance at her erstwhile teammates, she turned her back on them, elbowed her way into the hall, and fled.

_How could they_? her mind cried out as she ran towards the employee exit. _How could they go through with it_?

Caught between tears and fury, Tessa tore down the two flights of stairs and pounded into the dim cavern of CPER's subterranean parking garage. There she stopped and sent her other sense in the direction of the ready room, hoping against hope that someone might have reconsidered and followed her. No pings came back; the others were gone.

_Fine_ , she thought sullenly. _Screw you, assholes. I don't need you. I don't need anybody_.

Ignoring the annoying stitch developing in her side, she trotted to her car and slipped within, thinking hard about her situation. She'd just thrown away her position at CPER, and with it, her authority to be at any of the bomb sites. However, this early on she was willing to bet there would be a lot of disorganization, a lot of scrambling and confusion. She could use that to her advantage if she was smart about it. As a bonus she still had her yellow EMS vest clutched in one hand.

_I've gotta come up with a plan. I can't just rush into the smoking ruins and start scanning for life; I'd be arrested in seconds, no matter how good my intensions are. The vest will give me some cover but not enough. Eventually someone is bound to notice that I'm operating with no ID tags, on my own, without a partner._

But what if she _had_ a partner?

Dana.

Dana could go in with her, keep an eye out while she, Tessa, did her thing—if Dana was willing to get involved. Between the combined police and FBI presence, the crowds, and all the media attention, the threat of exposure to her would be enormous.

Except that Dana currently didn't look a day over fifty. Correction, she looked about forty-five or so now. The woman seemed to be slowly ageing backwards, growing more youthful in tiny increments—a phenomenon she hadn't quite gotten up the nerve to ask about, mainly because she wasn't sure if it was really happening or just her lovelorn eyes playing tricks on her.

In any case, the last time Dana had appeared in the media was well over twenty years ago. What were the chances of someone pointing out the redhead and going, "Hey, isn't that the FBI-doctor-lady who was in the news like two decades ago?" Not very likely was the answer. She'd use that argument if it came to that.

Tessa steadied her hands on the steering wheel and mentally shouted _DANA!_ as loud as she could.

Dana's consciousness boiled up to the forefront of her mind. 'It's about time,' she responded, her sending bubbling with relief. 'I was beginning to worry that you were going to try something really crazy.'

_Define really crazy,_ she thought back nervously.

'Above and beyond calling the head of your organization a liar, accusing him of cowardice, then attempting to incite a rebellion amongst your fellows?'

Tessa winced. _I thought your new shield was keeping me out._

'Hardly. It does effectively tune you out for the most part but I still receive your emotional flares loud and clear. And don't change the subject. You're not seriously thinking of infiltrating an active crime scene.'

_I could help people, Dana. I could save lives._

'And you could lose yours, have you thought about that?'

_The possibility has occurred to me and it's a risk I'm willing to take._

'What if I'm not?'

_I'd understand and I'd go without you._

A strangely biting laugh echoed behind Tessa's eyes. 'You misunderstand me; what if I'm not willing to _let you_ risk your life?'

The icy question was a slap in the face. _How can you say that?_ Tessa sputtered indignantly. _You were a doctor!_ _You used to be in the FBI!_

'I was, past tense, and neither my doctorate nor the bureau could protect my loved ones when it mattered. But I can and will protect you. Go home.'

Dana was refusing to help. More, she was refusing to let her help, a betrayal so monumental Tessa was rocked to her foundations. _How could you?_ her whispered sending was lined with pain. Futilely she searched for a spark of anger to fight with. For the first time in her life she found none. _How could you just let them die?_

'Everything dies, Tessa. Go. Home. Now. Don't make me come get you.' Dana's final sending brooked no argument.

The young woman sat shivering, hands clutching the steering wheel like a life preserver as a tidal wave of agonizing defeat crashed over her. Everything she believed to be true, every article of faith she had ever held dear was a smoldering pile of ash and ruin. CPER had cast her off. Her colleagues had rejected her. Even Dana had forsaken her.

_Mom and dad would have stood by me_ , she thought shutting her eyes tightly against a surge of bitter tears as she started the car. _I'm sure of that._ But was she really? After all of this, she wasn't certain of anything anymore.

The drive to her apartment felt unreal. It had been so long since she'd been to her place in Georgetown that the once familiar route seemed strange and foreboding. Her hands kept wanting to turn the wheel back towards her mother's house, back towards Dana, and she was repeatedly forced to remind them that Dana was not someone she wanted to see. This nugget of unhappy knowledge took her so far down the rabbit hole her already strained composure threatened to unravel completely.

Tessa climbed the stairs to her floor slowly, each footfall heavy with disillusionment. Dana had been her guiding light, the magnetic north of her moral compass, for as long as she could remember. The ex-agent was a righter of wrongs, a proponent of truth and justice, a woman who had risked her life to save others as a matter of course, which made the change in her ethics from kind and selfless to egocentric mercenary all the more devastating. If this was who Dana was now then she, Tessa, rejected her, wanted nothing more to do with her.

Standing before her front door, a rush of irrational fear froze her in place. If she went inside there was no going back. The Dana she loved would be a thing of the past, the woman in her place an enemy to be fought. The idea was soul-crushing.

With her senses so blunted by grief, she didn't detect the ping coming from inside the apartment until the door swung open. Her startled eyes took in an impossible sight; glaring across the threshold like some tattooed, leather-clad gargoyle was her would-be attacker from The Stalwart Tavern. The man Dana had fed on to save her, back when Dana had been one of the good guys.

There was only enough time for one shocked breath before Biker Boy's hands settled around her throat and pulled her in.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "X-Files (Unkle Variation on a Theme Surrender Sounds Session #10)" – Mark Snow

                                             "People Like Us" – Kelly Clarkson

                                             "Hero" – Chad Kroeger featuring Josey Scott

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We have reached the end of another chapter, dear readers. I suspect many of you are thinking very angry WTF thoughts, and rightly so, but please, please, please trust me; this isn't what it looks like (no, seriously, I mean it!) and hope is not lost.
> 
> I've seen a number of other fic-writers add their musical inspirations to their stories, an idea I really like being that every single one of my chapters has at least one "soundtrack" song that I write to, so I've decided to add my own inspiration music. Over the next few days I'll be editing the previous chapters and adding their soundtracks as well. :)
> 
> As always, big heartfelt thank yous to everyone who has left kudos. Your comments are also welcome, even angry WTF ones.


	16. Chapter 13-Not Everything Dies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Tessa's world falling down around her ears and her relationship with Dana strained to the breaking point, nothing is what it seems.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I've finished this latest chapter and in record time! It's amazing what I can accomplish when I have two weeks off. :)

Kew Gardens Apartments

Washington, DC

September 24, 2042 -- 12:42pm

 

"Don't scream," Biker Boy said, his bass voice low and intimate, his thumbs pressed against Tessa's windpipe.

The PN gulped a breath and nodded. There was no point in screaming. Other than the two of them the building was empty. There was no one to hear her cries for help except Dana and she wasn't receiving any response from that direction despite the panic she was babbling down their shared connection.

When Biker Boy's ping rang through her again, this time with no distraction, astonishment stilled her mental shrieking. His ping—a deep-throated, mellow bell tone—that was Dana's ping! But that was impossible! Pings were like fingerprints, no two were ever alike. Which meant that incredible as it seemed, this bristly-chinned, scruffy, leather-chapped, very male looking person was—

"Dana?" she gasped.

The hands still gripping Tessa's throat loosened and slipped to her shoulders. "Oh, thank God," the man sighed, closing his dark eyes in relief. "I thought I'd have to go through some elaborate song and dance—"

Tessa flung herself away, eyes wide with shock. "So, first you order me home like a kid, then you put on the world's worst Halloween costume and try to scare me to death? What the fuck is _wrong_ with you?"

"Keep your voice down."

"The hell I will. Get out of my apartment!"

"Tess—"

"GET—" Tessa's vocal chords froze in mid-screech, her body ceased to obey her, and suddenly Biker Boy's furious face was millimeters away.

"Dammit, Tessa, use your brain and think for a second! In all the years I've been a part of your life, have I  _ever_  refused to help you? Have I ever  _not_  supported you, backed you, been there for you? Think!"

Never. From day one, Dana had stood by her. No matter how hare-brained the scheme, no matter how insane the plan, Dana would offer counsel, warn her against certain courses of action, and stick around to provide moral support or pull her fat out of the fire when she got into trouble but never had she ever said no.

The entire mental conversation they had shared took on a different flavor. It abruptly dawned on Tessa that at no point had Dana negated her idea, only the risking of her life in the process. She'd then reiterated her promise to protect her and told her to come home. Where she had been waiting. In a spectacularly realistic disguise.

Correction: this was no disguise at all. This man _was_ Dana. Or Dana was _him_ , but how? Prosthetic makeup might explain the face, but the body? Biker Boy was six feet tall if he was an inch and the very real feel of his lean muscles were completely out of the realm of even the most advanced FX studios. Human hands could not pull this off.

But an alien-human hybrid could.

All alien-human hybrids had shapeshifting potential, even post-Return hybrids; especially post-Return hybrids. Shapeshifting was the typical EBE's primary talent. Tessa knew this as a matter of course but she'd never developed much interest in the extraterrestrial side of CPER, her attention largely taken up with myth species research. As focused as she was on Dana's vampirism, she'd mostly forgotten that the woman was also an alien-human hybrid. A post-Return hybrid. An EBE.

Sonofabitch.

"When were you gonna tell me you could shapeshift?" she asked weakly.

Biker Boy's left eyebrow rose in a very Dana-like way, "Are you accusing me of withholding information now too?"

"No, never! Please, Dana, I'm—"

"Do _not_ apologize to me," she said, turning away. "I don't want to hear it."

"But—"

"No!" The rebuff, both vocal and mental, silenced her. "This 'bad guy' has heard quite enough from you today."

Tessa's heart curled in on itself.

"Where do you get off judging me?" Dana said in Biker Boy's deep gruff tones. "When did I ever give you a reason to doubt my motives? What did I ever do to make you think—all of those hurtful things about me?"

Tessa cringed in shame. "Nothing but—"

"I'm not perfect, Tessa," Dana barked, cutting her off. "I'm no superhero. Your mother, your father, Mulder, we're none of us unflawed. The things we did—" her breath hitched making Biker Boy's shoulders shudder. "We do things sometimes that are morally questionable. To save others. To save ourselves. It's part of what makes us human."

"I didn't mean to hurt you!" she said quickly, afraid of another rejection.

"But you did hurt me," came the rumbled answer. "You got angry and you acted on that anger without thinking, just like you did when you were a kid. And now you're apologizing like one too as if that could make it better, but you're not ten years old anymore, Tessa. I thought by now you'd understand that apologies don't mean anything if you don't learn from your mistakes. But I'll give your broken clock some credit for being right twice today, we _can_ save lives and there is no point having these so-called gifts if we don't help people."

A small flame of hope flickered to life in Tessa's chest. "Y-you mean we're g-going?"

"Why else would I look like this?" Dana turned to stare at her through Biker Boy's exasperated eyes. "But the mentor/student bullshit ends today. From here on out, I am your _superior officer_. You will treat my orders like the word of God. If I tell you to move, you move. If I tell you to shut up, you shut up. No questions, no arguments, this is no longer a democracy. Do I make myself clear?"

Tessa dropped her eyes and nodded, uncertain of her ability to open her mouth without bursting into tears and disgracing herself further.

"Good. Have you eaten?"

She shook her head.

"Even better. I don't need you throwing up on me." Dana strode to the door.

'What do you mean?" Tessa croaked.

A fiendish grin spread over Biker Boy's stubbly visage. "You'll see."

\------   ------   ------   ------   ------

The body Dana was currently, for lack of a better word, wearing had a name. Richard Berkowitz, no direct relation to the serial killer, none that her extensive background search had unearthed, at any rate. She'd had no logical reason for all the work that she'd put into adding him to her list of viable aliases but after she'd buried the remains, something told her it would be worth the effort to. She'd never imagined back then that she'd one day be modeling the guy's body. It certainly wasn't her first choice.

Tessa's detection of an anomalous layer of striated muscle tissue beneath her epidermis was what had given Dana the idea in the first place. She'd seen it before in the preserved remains of an elderly man and later in his randy and morally reprehensible son, Eddie something-or-other. The man may have been a forgettable personality but she'd never fail to recall how he'd managed to impersonate Mulder by employing that musculature, effectively _becoming_ him. She'd worked quietly on her own since the discovery, slowly developing the knack of manipulating the additional tissue and later determining that she wasn't limited to purely skin-deep adjustments.

Why hadn't she told Tessa? If Dana were honest with herself it was because Tessa was the only person, herself included, who still adamantly held to the belief of her essential humanity. She was reticent to jeopardize that belief by bringing the girl up to speed on what was clearly an alien ability. She, Dana, needed that faith too much to risk it.

Leave it to Tessa to pull her maniac Braveheart crap and get fired. If her nervous system hadn't been kicked into high gear and at the worst possible moment—well, now the cat was out of the bag. It was enough to make her want to yank the kid sideways and give her a good spanking.

_Oh God, I think I may have become my father,_ Dana thought unhappily.

In all fairness, the young PN wasn't entirely to blame. It was Dana who'd been running around like a madwoman, desperate to come up with a workable contingency plan while wishing vehemently that she weren't a five-foot-nothing pixie without a single threatening feature to her name. It was her own desire to be bigger, taller, more intimidating—her body had simply risen to the challenge her mind had presented.

And she didn't dare attempt to change into someone more appropriate. Her control over this aspect of herself was minimal; holding the look together was proving difficult enough. So, despite the questionable use of a felon as camouflage at a crime scene—Berkowitz boasted a record as long and wretched as a Victor Hugo novel—this bad joke, seemingly conceived by a demented puppeteer in the dark bowels of Jim Henson's Creature Shop, was what she had to work with.

"Somehow, I don't think Ricky the Homicidal Biker will ever be as popular as Big Bird," she muttered under her breath then grimaced as she caught Tessa's timid glance out of the corner of her eye. She used to give her father similar fleeting looks whenever she was in dutch with him. She'd never understood at the time why he hated it so much but she could relate to the memory of his annoyance now.

Tessa had been very quiet since heaving herself into the passenger side of the dirty white pick-up Dana was driving. Some of that was lingering nausea; a fireman's carry wasn't a pleasant way to travel at the best of times and Dana had not given her a smooth ride when she'd hurtled across five blocks worth of rooftops to get to the vehicle. Tessa was also preoccupied with thinking softly; trying in her chastised-puppy way not to disturb her with her fear, anxiety, and remorse as if her emotions would somehow not reach her at such close range if she felt them quietly enough. Another time Dana might have been charmed into allowing Tessa her little self-delusion; not today. 

"Quiet down over there," she rasped, relishing the way Tessa jumped instantly to attention and hating herself for enjoying it. "If you need to think about something, concentrate on something useful, like how to keep it together when you see your first body."

Dana watched Tessa wince visibly at her harsh words— _no doubt about it, I have definitely become my father_—then, to her combined relief and regret, Tessa's thoughts focused resolutely on memories of the search and rescue training sessions she'd attended. What on earth were CPER's directors playing at, thinking that a couple of classes could prepare any group, much less a bunch of sensitives, to face the nightmare sights of a collapsed building? They were blithely sending their children into hell for a bump in public opinion; disgusting.

'You're speeding down the highway to hell dressed like an AC/DC groupie with one of those children in tow, Scully,' intoned an unexpected voice from the back of Dana's mind, a very familiar, wry toned voice. 'I don't think you're in any position to criticize.'

_Oh, my God_ , she thought back, her mind reeling, _Mulder??_

'What's up, Doc?'

Dana smothered her rush of elation; this was no time for distractions. _Christ, Mulder,_ _your timing is—_

'Impeccable, as always,' he interjected smoothly. 'Want to fill me in on what I've missed?'

_Sounds to me like you're pretty well up to speed. Where the hell have you been?_

'So sentimental, Scully; people will say we're in love.'

_That's ancient history; people will say you're dodging the question._

'Ah, you wound me.' The sensation of a smile followed. 'I wasn't needed. You were doing just fine on your own, you and Tessa.'

_But now I'm not?_

'Don't you think you're taking this punishment thing a bit too far? Since when are you this vindictive?'

Dana stifled a sigh. _I'm not, but I don't know how else to get my point across. I've been kind, understanding, supportive, stern—none of it's worked. This is all I have left._

'You're castigating the kid for doing what she was encouraged to do since she was a toddler, know her own mind, question authority, try fearlessly.'

_And look at the result. She's thrown away her life and her career—_

'Not necessarily.'

There was a moment of tense silence between their two minds.

_Meaning?_

'Tessa has a friend at CPER, someone who's working very hard to remedy the situation in her favor.'

_Why?_ Dana warily asked.

'Because CPER is still young. Their foundation isn't set in stone yet and their rules are still being written. It's been twenty-three years since its establishment and the Senate is still arguing over whether the organization should fall under the Department of the Interior, the Department of Justice or the Department of Health and Human Services. Let's just say it's in the best interests of everyone involved that Tessa continues to be a willing part of the center's evolution.'

Another moment of tension followed.

'I admit that sounds a bit like I'm channeling my cigarette sucking sperm-donor, doesn't it?'

_Mulder—_

'It's okay, Scully. I accepted the unfortunate reality of my paternity a long time ago. DNA makes him my sire; it doesn't make him my father.'

Dana's mind was already sprinting ahead. _But Tessa's connection to CPER lies in direct correlation to her DNA, doesn't it?_

'She _is_ the sole Paranormal offspring of the agents whose work was the basis of its creation. Without the X-Files, the Centers for Paranormal  & Extraterrestrial Research would not exist.'

_She's not the only Paranormal child born of such a union_ , Dana reluctantly thought, forcing it through despite the pain.

'She's the only one with a public profile so, for now, she's the one that matters. You stand at the crossroads of a very crucial moment in time, Scully. What you and Tessa do today will influence a lot more than you think.'

Dana was tempted to make an acerbic reference to Deep Throat but was unable to muster the proper air of disbelief when her own intuition was so strongly in line with Mulder's cryptic comments. She'd been on edge for weeks—since Tessa had told her about Madeline's terrorist vision, to be exact—and she had been secretly planning for the worst ever since, from purchasing equipment and memorizing blueprints, to devising backup plans for every possible scenario she could think of. Why had she done any of it if not because she'd known the shit would inevitably go down and Tessa would need one reliable person in place to turn to?

Just like Tessa to be unpredictable, to let her principles get ahead of her thinking brain, to mouth off and get her ass censured, in sum, to do the one thing Dana could not have anticipated or prepared for. The idiot.

'I did a lot more than mouth off during our time together at the Bureau, Scully, and you never reamed _me_ this hard.'

_True._ Dana paused. _I did shoot you, though._

'Just the once.'

_Just the once_ , she agreed with an inward chuckle. _I can't believe I'm thinking this with a straight face but your antics, insane as they were, still showed a bit more temperance. You did occasionally walk the thin line. Tessa doesn't have even your minimal restraint._

'You're slipping, Doc. Executive functions like impulse-control reside in the frontal lobes, one of the last areas of the brain to mature. I was thirty-two when Blevins introduced you to _my_ perfectly aged and well-balanced insanity, at least give Tessa 'til she's in _her_ thirties before dropping the hammer.'

Mulder did have a point.

_You know, I've never given much thought to karma before_ , she quipped dryly, _but I'm beginning to think it's my lot in life to be teamed up with terminally over-enthusiastic partners that I'm constantly forced to run around saving._

'And you love it.'

_Love is a strong word._

'Come on, Scully. Tell me you're not excited that you're back in the game.'

This is no game, Mulder. This is about protecting people; it's about saving lives.

'Exactly,' he replied with characteristic swagger. 'You're about to hit the first checkpoint. Why don't you and your still-wet-behind-the-ears-partner kiss and make up before her young, undeveloped frontal lobes explode?'

Dana bit back a laugh. _I'm not that easy. But I am willing to bend a little._

She stretched out a hand, placing it tenderly on the PN's shoulder. "Tessa," she said aloud.

The girl jumped at her touch, and again Dana felt that not entirely pleasant combination of pleasure and pain at Tessa's total and immediate focus.

"I'm not going to let you fall," she continued, wishing she could somehow morph the harsh, masculine voice this body came with into something gentler, more appropriate to her feelings. "My anger and hurt notwithstanding, I won't ever let you fall. Understood?"

She took her eyes off the road just long enough to see Tessa's nod and read the expression on her face. Remorse and anxiety were still there but so too was the infamous Doggett tenacity. Her fear had mercifully diminished. Good. Dana returned her hand to the steering wheel.

The checkpoint was just ahead, traffic slowing to a crawl as uniformed police redirected cars onto the designated detour lanes, waving through fire-rescue vehicles, law enforcement officers, and other authorized personnel.

"When they ask, show your ID tag and don't look scared. Remember, you belong here."

" _We_ belong here. You and me." The hoarse words were the first Tessa had voiced since they'd left the apartment.

Approval radiated from the part of her brain that held Mulder's consciousness. 'From the mouths of babes, Scully,' he said.

Dana tried to keep her expression severe but was unable to completely suppress the tiny smile that touched the stubbled edges of her mouth.

_That's my girl,_ she thought back.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mood and Inspiration Music: "I Hate Myself for Loving You" – Joan Jett and the Blackhearts

                                             "Sorry" – Madonna

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, have I redeemed myself for the last chapter, fellow readers? I hope so.
> 
> For the record, when I began this narrative, I never imagined I would still be writing it after a year. Thank you all for reading and for leaving kudos, and thank you for sticking with this story and these characters. They mean a lot to me too; I won't let them fall.
> 
> PS - Would anyone like to share their thoughts on the plot's progression? Or just pretend to Force choke me for putting our beloved Scully through all this? Please consider leaving a comment. I'd really like to hear from you.


End file.
